Same Body, New Soul Same Story, New Role
by taking it easy
Summary: In some sort of freak event, Naruto's soul is switched out with someone else's. Someone who knows the story of Naruto. Someone who has the knowledge, and now, the power, do some some crazy sh- I mean do some good, starting with the Hyuga incident. NaruHina. Eventual KakaAnko, SasuSaku, ShikaTema, KibaIno, NejiTen, and KonoHana. Naruto centered and T for cussing. Parodyish.
1. Same Body, New Soul

An exhausted groan escaped from the lips of a two year old blonde boy. He rolled over in his bed as his eyelids separated to reveal his dazed blue eyes.

"I… Hate… Mornings…" The boy groaned as he struggled to sit up. "Where am I?" He asked no one as he looked around the room. Examining it closer, he added, "Why does everything look weird?"

He shook his head as he got up, his bare feet touching lightly on the cold floor. He stretched as he walked to the door and, upon opening it, entered another unfamiliar room.

"Okay, what's up? This is not my house." The blonde said, entering a slightly panicked state.

He went through another door and into the bathroom. Before he even took to more steps, he had looked at the mirror to see himself.

"Naruto? What the hell?" He asked as he brought his arms up to scratch his head. His spiky golden locks shifted as his fingers moved them, the reflection moving the same way.

On a whim, the boy decided to move around, doing random gestures, before finally reaching forward to touch the mirror.

Satisfied that he had felt the cold glass as opposed to warm skin, he promptly screamed, "What the hell happened to me?"

He reached around, touching all different parts of his body, before finally arriving at a conclusion.

After hitting his head six or seven times, he realized his conclusion – he is dreaming – was false.

The boy – Naruto – rubbed his now slightly sore head as he looked at his reflection further.

"Stay calm, Ma- Naruto, whoever you are, there's only one explanation." He said at last, stumbling over his own name based on what he looked like. He continued, "You are in the body of a – Five years old? Six? – an anime character," As he came to this idea – the correct one – he did the only logical thing anyone that this author knows would do – faint.

Later, the boy – who will, in fact, be called Naruto for lack of confusion – awoke. Quickly realizing that, yes, he was an anime character; he quickly regained his bearing, got dressed, and left his apartment. His mind quickly went over everything he knew about the show he was currently in.

Naruto was an oblivious idiot that never gave up, never knew his parents, had seriously overpowered potential, was loyal, was short tempered, and had an obsession with ramen; how typical of anime – or television in general, for that matter.

This boy, now the new Naruto, however, while he rarely gave up – he tried not to try in the first place – did know his parents – his and Naruto's – didn't have any potential that he knew of, and was generally laid back. He was fairly loyal, too, but he did lack a distinct love for ramen.

Having decided, the boy explored his new home, which he thought was way cooler than his old, boring one, until he discovered Ichiraku's Ramen.

A few minutes later, he also decided that said ramen was indeed worthy of obsession.

_The next day, this occurred._

Naruto decided to go out again and explore more of the village. Today, however, he noticed a big change. The boy had barely gotten out of his apartment when he was blindsided by some villagers, who then beat him up and left no part of him un-bruised.

Soon after that little incident the young boy, who he now knew turned three today, so he wasn't too far off in his guess the day before, learned that today was the day of the Lord Fourth Festival.

The Lord Fourth Festival, commonly called the Fourth Festival, celebrated the Fourth's defeating the Nine Tailed Fox, who Naruto knew was named Kurama.

Sorting through his memories again as he hid in a trashcan two blocks away from Ichiraku's, Naruto figured out that today was his birthday. Sneaking a peak at the goings on outside, he then decided to use this newfound information.

Using the imprinted stealth skills that this body had, the boy – skinny but smart teenager in mind, malnourished legend-to-be kid in body – sneaked to Ichiraku's.

The boy quickly jumped over the counter and crouched down, effectively putting himself out of view from his attackers, he looked up at Teuchi, the owner.

Teuchi looked down at Naruto and raised an eyebrow. "Naruto," He said, "What are you doing?"

"Hiding," the boy replied frantically, not daring to move.

Teuchi, knowing of Naruto and his tenant, though he didn't care, and therefore of the villager's hatred, nodded, saying, "Okay, well anyway, happy birthday, Naruto,"

Ayame, a seven year old girl at this time, walked out and spotted Naruto, who promptly put a finger at his mouth to signal that she should be quiet.

Ayame quirked an eyebrow and squatted next to the young boy, before whispering, "Happy birthday Naruto."

Naruto, knowing he was wearing a bright orange jumpsuit, nodded in thanks and then asked, "Can you two do me a favor?" Seeing their confused nod, he continued, "Can you get me some more clothes? Orange is great and all, but too much and it gets on people's nerves."

Not even hesitating or questioning the young boy's sudden change of heart about his clothes – not knowing that it's not the same mindset – Teuchi nodded and asked if he wanted a certain color.

"Grays and blacks, please. And sandals, too," He thought for a moment, "And, if it's not too much trouble, a dark green cape with a hood."

After questioning that last part, Teuchi accepted and handed he boy, who was still seated on the floor behind the counter, a bowl of pork ramen – his favorite.

_A few weeks later, this happened._

Naruto woke up and looked at his calendar. "December 27," it read. Naruto nodded and got up to do his daily morning routine.

Said routine consisted of getting dressed, doing chakra exercises he remembered from watching the show – he was on tree walking now – then a minor workout to increase his strength and speed. He patiently waited for nightfall as he stayed in his house for the day and watched the Cloud envoy.

He had adjusted to the different life style rather quickly, deciding that he would make this story different from the original, starting with the Hyuuga incident. He had also decided that he would leave Itachi be, since he didn't want the rest of the Uchiha's to throw a coup, and instead be there for Sasuke afterwards, but that wasn't until four years from now.

As nightfall arrived and he overheard some civilians talking about how the envoy would be staying at the Hyuuga compound, Naruto donned his cape for the first time after getting it and made his way to the Hyuuga's place.

He sneakily avoided the tricky Byaku-vision, and made his way to Hinata's room, hiding and effectively not moving or making a sound.

After what seemed like hours, Hinata finally entered to retire for the night, and Naruto suddenly realized that, not only was he trespassing, spying, and eventually going to be fighting, but he was also liable to be considered remarkably perverted if he was caught.

A little while later, he felt someone coming. Immediately thinking it was the kidnapper and not even considering the fact that it could be her mom or dad, as that would be bad, Naruto crept up to Hinata and, without waking her – a miracle, really – he hid her in his hiding spot and got under the covers.

His immediate thought was, "Hmm, lavender," as he curled up in the bundle and listed for the tell-tale sign of the man entering. He heard coming from behind him, which was good on so many levels he could only thank Naruto's ungodly luck, because that was the direction of the window, so it was the kidnapper.

He felt himself be lifted up onto the guy's shoulders.

"Success so far, now if only Hiashi will be stalled and this guy gets away, all will be well." Naruto thought.

Again, Lady Luck showed her being enamored with the blonde and they made it to the walls.

_The next day, the envoy left and nothing bad happened._

Naruto absently thought of what would happen when Hiashi found Hinata in a box. Ignoring the thought, he shifted a bit. Never really one for tact, in either life, he did the thing he thought best to do.

"Where the hell am I!?"

Like hot rocks the Cloud ninja that was carrying him dropped him the ground and he unfurled himself from the blanket.

Most of the enemies looked to the ones that – Naruto presumed – was the one who actually performed the kidnapping.

Again, an absent thought ran through Naruto's mind. This time, it was that, what if he had used a shadow clone, instead?

Shaking his head at that, and remembering that he didn't know how, the boy glared at his kidnappers.

"Who are you?" The men asked.

Almost immediately he decided to not give his real name. "Answer my question first." He answered instead. Glancing at his surrounding, he decided that he had no idea where he was.

"You're at the border of the Land of Fire," one man replied. "Now, who are you?"

"Ichigo Kurosaki," Naruto said almost immediately, wondering why he chose that name.

The men looked at each other and decided that they had screwed up, so they looked at Naruto again before ditching him.

"… Damn it." The boy said after a moment. Thinking for a minute, he shouted, "ANBU! If you're there, point me towards home please!"

Not getting a response, he looked in the direction his captors had run off in. Making a quick – and mostly accurate – map in his head, he walked off in the general direction of Konoha.

"I am so glad I'm not a temperamental idiot."

_A couple of days later, this took place._

It was mid-afternoon when Naruto reached the gates.

Partially starved, the boy chose to enter stealthily, so he waited until the chunin guards switched shifts and sneaked right on through, remaining unseen. His clothes were dirty, his cape was dirty, and he was dirty. So the first thing he did was take a shower.

The second thing he did was rush right to Ichiraku's to eat.


	2. Starting the Academy

Naruto stood in front of the Third Hokage, waiting for the benevolent old man to finish the paper.

The boy, now five, was about to start the academy and, as an orphan, needed the Hokage to get his application paper's signed.

The day before, he had gone to Teuchi to ask if he buy him some weapons. He had taken to paying the man for them, thus making him a sort of middle man. So now, fully ready to learn to be a ninja, something he – the real he – had always wanted.

He felt around the room, sensing five ANBU, none of them being either Kakashi or Yamato.

Two years prior, he had gone into a meditative coma and met his tenant, Kurama. The fox had been amused at the fact that he was not the least bit afraid of him, but still denied the offer to work with him.

Naruto had left the offer there, ready to be accepted, but all Kurama did was give him some sensing abilities.

With these abilities, he could not only sense chakra – both quantity and affinity, which was cool – but also emotion.

He was brought out of his musing over the experience when Hiruzen, the Hokage, cleared his throat and handed him the papers. Remembering what he was here for in the first place, Naruto smiled and thank the old man while bowing.

He left while saying, "Thanks, Gramps!"

_At the academy, this transpired._

Naruto entered the room and immediately put the different chakras he felt to name as he surveyed the room.

He saw many familiar faces – Ino, Choji, Shikamaru, Sasuke, Sakura, Kiba, Shino and Hinata. He also saw Iruka at the front and stood up straighter than he was.

"Hello, you must be the new student." Iruka said stiffly, and Naruto idly wondered when he'd start warming to him. Thinking on it, he ignored the man's introductory speech, opting to remember that Iruka hadn't been a fan of Naruto's until he [Naruto] had pulled pranks and reminded him [Iruka] of himself [Iruka again].

Jumping as he heard Iruka yell at him, Naruto ignored the snickers and tuned in again before introducing himself.

"Hi, my name is Naruto Uzumaki," the boy said mildly struggling to keep his gaze moving over the entire class so as to not single anyone out. "I like ramen. I dislike all the villagers who dislike me," He said casually, and continued, "My hobbies include daydreaming and my dream is to…" The boy trailed off as he looked up thoughtfully.

After a moment of silence, Iruka had decided he wasn't going to continue and was about to tell the boy to sit down. Naruto, however, wasn't finished quite yet.

"My dream is to be the greatest Hokage ever and to protect the villagers who do like me." The boy said forcefully, a bright metaphorical flame shining in his eyes. He bowed slightly at Iruka before walking to a seat.

Iruka blinked before nodding hesitantly, and then went off into a longwinded speech about what they would learn.

After a few days, their first test came along, and it occurred to Naruto that he was supposed to be the dead last, for that was how Team Seven came to be. Needless to say that day, he had easily secured the position of dead last. Failing most written exams, and scraping by in the physical department.

He quickly noticed that, even though he stopped the Hyuuga incident two years prior, Hinata was still suffering confidence problems. Thinking on it, he chalked it up to her naturally shy nature and her father's strict methods of education.

It occurred to him that Hizashi, Neji's father, should still be alive, and therefore, Neji wouldn't be all fate obsessed.

He stopped doing his daily exercises for a moment, thinking further as he looked down. If he did comfort Sasuke in a few years, what effect would that have on the storyline?

Shaking his head, he sensed the presence of Hinata behind a tree, watching him.

Smirking to himself, he thought, "So it begins." He made a big show of being hot before shedding his jacket and shirt. His mental smirk widened when he felt the chakra spike that showed her embarrassment as well as admiration.

After two years of working out the way he did everyday while still being sure it didn't cause muscle degeneration, he gotten quite a body, and he was only five.

Concentrating again on his work, he pushed all thoughts out of his mind. Strengthening his body and increasing his speed without having to chakra for either – that is the priority.

_Three years later, after the Uchiha Massacre, this happened._

Sasuke became even more silent and standoffish than usual, which of course only appealed more to his fans. Naruto decided that he would try to be friends.

Key word: try.

He failed miserably; and Sasuke's fans beat him up for it, too.

Soon after, however, something he did not expect happened. Someone knocked on the door to his apartment, but instead of seeing someone, he saw goggles.

These goggles were special, because they were the goggles that he wore before getting his headband.

Naruto smiled brightly at the gift, and felt someone's joy a few meters away. Sensing that general area, he felt Hinata's presence.

"So she was the one to give me these goggles?" The boy thought.

Hinata watched as the boy cracked an enormous grin and put the goggles on, feeling immensely happy that her crush liked her gift. Her joy overpowered the depression that came with being too shy to give it to him directly, but Naruto felt anyway.

_The next day, another event occurred._

Naruto walked into the room, smiling brighter than ever and wearing the green goggles Hinata left for him the day before.

Naruto's dead last act was extremely good. Everyone actually thought he was the oblivious idiot, although he still kept his laid back attitude. Naruto, not having any parents or teachers that knew he could do better, was really slacking off and even took to skipping or napping.

He had rigged a transmitter-recorder to the teacher's desk, so that he always knew was they were teaching, though, so he was learning while not listening.

Anyway, he knew about Hinata's crush on him, and he knew everyone else knew about it but didn't know that he himself knew.

This is the reason that it was such a shock when he strolled on in and sat right next Hinata – extra close – before class started and asked her out.

He was very pleasantly when she only blushed and nodded with a smile, instead of fainting.

The date, needless to say, went off without hitches of any kind. He and Hinata had gone home after class to get ready, and Hinata met him right where she was supposed to, which was well away from her clan compound. Naruto sensed the different girls from their class who were spying on them – they were ditched quite easily. The pair went to Ichiraku's, the only restaurant that would have Naruto, where Teuchi and the thirteen year old Ayame had fixed it to be more romantic. And finally, the pair ate a delicious meal, complete with ramen and cinnamon buns – Hinata's favorite, though the girl in question had no idea how Naruto knew. The pair didn't do anything more than hold hands, but they were mercilessly teased by the boys of their class, and glared at by the girls who failed at spying on them.

All in all, it was a good experience for the two of them.


	3. Ending the Academy

Naruto was ecstatic.

Five years had passed since Naruto's first date experience. He was now thirteen and about to take the Academy Graduation Exam. He and Hinata had gone out more, gotten to know each other better, and soon, he was planning on telling her that he knew she gave him the goggles.

Regardless of these facts, Naruto was not happy because of them. No, Naruto was happy because he was finally fast enough – sneaky enough – to evade the full team of ANBU that were chasing him for painting graffiti on the Hokage Mountain.

"Bad habits kill good ninja," he reminded himself mentally, making sure not to let Iruka find him.

As good an attempt he made, he still failed. He chalked up another point for Iruka mentally as he thought of the chakra sonar technique that the man had.

"Fourteen for me; a hundred six for Iruka," He thought glumly as he was being tied up and dragged bak to the academy.

Naruto was thrown on the floor as he heard everyone groan when Iruka declared they would be reviewing the transformation technique.

He absently listened as Shikamaru and Ino complained to him about this being his fault as Sakura and Sasuke took their turns.

"You think I care?" He replied offhandedly as he went up to perform the technique.

Silently mouthing the words – he always felt it dumb to shout them – he made the necessary hand seals before disappearing in a relatively small puff of smoke. When the smoke dissipated, Iruka's lower jaw bone dropped to the floor as he looked at the figure.

Naruto had transformed – rather perfectly – into his father, Minato, though no one else knew it was his father.

_Meanwhile_

Over in Iwa, everyone who fought in the Third Great Shinobi War shuddered collectively.

_Back at the Academy_

"T-The Fourth H-Hokage," Iruka whisered, before regaining his composure, "Ahem, very good, Naruto. Next!"

Naruto smirked mentally. They had studied the Fourth extensively at one point, but had not once seen a picture of him.

Eventually, it was time for the actual exams. When Naruto's turn came along, Hinata – who had long since gained confidence and lost her stutter, a fantastic side-effect of their dates – squeezed his hand and wished him luck.

"I don't need luck," Naruto thought even as he nodded at her and smiled, "I need shadow clones, which means I need to fail."

And fail he did.

Sat back on the swing acting all depressed after he told Hinata that he was fine, and he waited for Mizuki, Iruka's assistant teacher, to come to him.

After the traitor-to-be came to him and told him about the scroll he accepted and went home to get ready. As he absentmindedly got the things he would need, he had a stray thought about Kakashi and what he [Naruto] would do when they met.

He put that thought away for later to think on, and set out towards the Hokage tower.

Naruto mentally hummed the Mission Impossible theme as he sneaked through the tower.

He took out ANBU, hid in shadows, walked along walls and ceilings, and even crawled along the outside surface of the building.

He silently unlocked, opened, closed, and relocked windows as he proceeded through the high security tower.

He observed the patrol routes relentlessly as he dampened his chakra output so as to not be sensed.

One particular ANBU spotted him and attacked. Immediately, Naruto leapt into action, silencing his opponent with a swift jab to the throat before knocking the guy out and moving him to a secure location.

He crept over to the locked door leading to the Hokage's office and quickly gave it the same treatment he did the windows and entering the office.

Instantly, the boy was in the shadows and off the radar as he placed a multi-layered genjutsu on the old man so he'd think everything was normal.

He nimbly evaded the senses of everyone and took the Forbidden Scroll of Seals, his objective, and agilely leapt out the window of the office, closing it behind him, releasing the genjutsu, and leaving a transformed log in the scroll's place.

"Yeah, that would have been awesome." Naruto thought dreamily as he strolled carelessly through the tower.

He waved to the ANBU as he passed, before entering the Hokage's office without a care in the world.

"Hey, Gramps," The boy said as he observed in amusement the old man almost celebrating his arrival and consequentially, an excuse to get out of doing paperwork.

The old man quickly adopted a look of sympathy as he said, "Hello, Naruto. I'm sorry you failed."

Naruto quickly went into acting mode as he brought his plan into play, "It's okay, it's my fault for not practicing, I guess." He smiled, "But anyway, I'm here for the make-up test."

He almost cackled at the Hokage's confused question, everything was going well so far. "What make-up test?"

He carefully controlled his face as he forced a smirk on, "Nice try, but Mizuki told me all about the whole 'Get the Forbidden Scroll and learn a technique' deal. I do that, and I pass, right? So that's what I'm here to do." The boy replied as he puffed out his chest.

The Hokage frowned and said, "I'm afraid Mizuki lied to you, there is no such test." Naruto could practically see the gears turning smoothly in his head. They were old and cracked, but still working.

He put on a confused face, "But, Mizuki said that-" He cut himself off, "What exactly is the scroll for?" He already knew, of course, but Hiruzen didn't know that.

"The scroll," The man said tentatively, "Is a scroll containing many forbidden techniques. Because of these dangerous techniques, the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, sealed it away."

Naruto purposely remained silent for a bit as he focused on the wary emotions of the Hokage, just before the man was going to speak again, he decided to round up his plan, "I think Mizuki is a traitor then, because he told me to come get the scroll and learn a technique to become a ninja, but if they're so dangerous, I would have died," He wisely left out how he knew it was dangerous to the user, "And he could have taken it for himself," for good measure – and his own amusement at using a funny word – he added, "To use for his own nefarious purposes."

The Hokage did look slightly surprised at the speech, but – put down another point for Devil Luck – decided to ignore Naruto seemingly sudden perception of the facts.

As an added bonus, the stars aligned for Naruto's horseshoe and four leaf clover as his rabbit's foot rubbed on him, because the Hokage offered him something astronomically good.

"I do have the authority to make you a genin, if you do something for me, Naruto." The Hokage said, trying to look casual to bait Naruto without the latter knowing he was. Of course, the former didn't know that Naruto had been playing puppet-master the whole time.

"What?" Naruto asked, struggling valiantly against the newfound urge to laugh until his ribs broke.

_Later, in the forest, when Mizuki and Iruka met up with Naruto, these events took place._

Naruto laid back, scroll in hand, taking a break. It took a little bit of convincing, but now he won't have ANBU on his tail for learning from the scroll. After all, he needed the scroll to learn the Shadow Clone Technique. Again he thanked the luck that the Chosen One apparently had, because no one mentioned anything about an ANBU disguising himself as the scroll.

"Found you, Naruto," Iruka said angrily as he walked up to the boy in question.

"Man, I'm acting a lot today, what is this, a T.V. show? Oh, wait, duh." Naruto thought as he said his lines. Sensing Mizuki throwing some shuriken – and noticing that Iruka did, too – Naruto jumping away from the spot he was just in.

Mizuki took one of the grando-size shuriken on his back and started twirling it as he made a speech.

"The real reason why the village hates you, Naruto, even Iruka. You want to know what it is?" Mizuki yelled He continued with waiting for an answer, completely ignoring Iruka's shouts, "You are the Nine Tailed Fox! The Fourth Hokage, your idol, sealed it inside of you! You are the beast that killed Iruka's parents!"

"So wait, which is it then?" Naruto asked casually as he sat back on the ground with his arms behind him to hold him up.

Mizuki stumbled mid-throw and the first of his pair of extra-large shuriken veered off course, striking the ground a few meters away from the pair on the ground.

"What do you mean 'which is it then'?" MIzuki asked, completely forgetting that he just tried to kill them.

"Well, you said I am the Nine Tailed Fox, but that the Fourth Hokage sealed it inside me. But I can't be sealed inside myself, so, which is it? Am I the Nine Tailed Fox, or is it just Sealed inside of me?" The boy looked on with no small amount of amusement as Mizuki thought back to his own words.

Meanwhile, Iruka took the initiative and replied, "It's just sealed inside of you Naruto, you're not –"

Iruka was cut off by Mizuki, who yelled, "Both! Because it took over your mind!"

"Bullshit!" Naruto yelled back, "If it took over my mind, then my pranks would be a lot worse than paint on rocks!" He walked over to the discarded shuriken. "The Fourth trusted me to hold back that beast, and I will. But more importantly," He glared fiercely at the white-haired traitor as he picked up the weapon, "I will protect Konoha from cold bastards like you!" He finished as he slung the shuriken as hard as he could toward Mizuki.

The traitor in question leaned backwards to avoid the shuriken before reaching out to grab it. He pulled his other shuriken and ignored Iruka's shouts of surprise in favor of gaping at the sudden line-up of lethal pointy objects hurdling through the air toward him. He spun his shuriken as shields to block the onslaught, yelping in surprised fear as each and every one of them turned out to be a shadow clone of Naruto.

Then, the beating took place.


	4. The Student Teaches

Naruto glared at the old man who had just denied him use of the picture he had taken. The two spent a few minutes arguing about the subject when they were interrupted by the old man's grandson.

"Die, Old Man!" The little boy yelled in conjunction with a battle cry as he charged with a toy shuriken in hand.

The boy nimbly jumped and performed a double somersault to avoid a kunai. When he landed, he rolled to his right, effectively dodging the sword strike that one of the four ANBU who appeared attack with. The boy then dived at a different ANBU and performed at perfect sweeping kick to knock the ANBU over.

The young warrior then picked the fallen ninja up by the legs and swung him around before launching him into the first one.

He then kicked off toward his third opponent, finally throwing the toy shuriken. With amazing skill, the shuriken was thrown straight to eye hole of the cat mask, half blinding the victim as the promising young ninja punched him in the gut before facing off the final ANBU.

The two competed in a staring contest for a few moments, and then the boy said, "Come and get some."

The ANBU ran off and left a puddle of yellow liquid that smelled suspiciously like pee.

Once again, the boy faced the Old Man, who was now decked out in black samurai-type armor. The two charged each other while performing hand signs and two huge dragons of pure chakra flew from the two opponents, launching at one another and exploding upon contact, level the entire village with a huge blast.

"Man, that would have been so cool." Naruto thought dreamily as the kid tripped on his own scarf.

"You tripped me, didn't you? Admit it!" The boy yelled at Naruto, bringing the latter out of his thoughts.

"What did you say, brat?" Naruto said as he picked the smaller child up by his scarf. He cocked his fist back as a new new-comer arrived at the scene.

"Honorable Grandson, you shouldn't run off like that," the man said as he glared at Naruto, "You, Brat, put him down! That is the Hokage's grandson!"

"Ha! You won't hit me now that you know the Hokage's my grandfather!" The boy stuck his tongue out at the blonde.

"I don't care if he's your grandmother!" Naruto shouted as he let his fist fly. The boy dropped to the floor in an unceremonious heap as the blonde genin walked away.

_Later, this happened._

Naruto stopped mid-step as he sensed the brat's presence. Looking to his right, he saw a small of fencing that appeared to be on its side. Without hesitation, he ripped the tarp out of the grasp of the young child – Konohamaru, his name was – and rotated it before giving back to the child.

"If you're going to hide, hide the right way." He said before walking away.

"Wait, Boss!"

"Boss?" Naruto asked in an amused tone.

"Yeah! You're the boss! You're going to teach me!" Konohamaru yelled excitedly.

"I am? That doesn't sound like me." Naruto responded with a smirk.

"Yes! You are!" The younger boy said stubbornly.

"Okay, then. Follow me." Naruto said, leading his new disciple to a secluded place.

The blonde extended his senses to make sure nobody was around. Once satisfied, he started, "Okay, the first element of any good prank is-"

"Pranks? No! I want to learn ninja techniques!" Konohamaru shouted angrily, cutting Naruto off.

"Ninja techniques? Kid, I'm the dead last of my class."

"What? But you're the kid who painted the Hokage Mountain and got away from elite ninja! You had to have used cool ninja moves to do that! Are you saying class has better moves?"

"Oh, that? I only used stealth. Stealth is the most important tool of any ninja." The genin replied. He smirked and then added, "And it helps to know how to use a ninja tarp." His blue eyes twinkled with amusement when Konohamaru got all flushed and glared at him.

"Well, teach me a cool jutsu! You're a ninja, so you have to know at least one!" The blonde's disciple yelled.

"Do you know how to focus chakra?" The brunette's master asked.

"Of course I do!" The student shouted indignantly.

"Go pluck two leaves from that tree over there, then." The teacher replied, ignoring the questioning face that followed. "Well? Go." He snapped.

Konohamaru scrambled over to the nearest tree and plucked two leaves from it. HE hurried back to Naruto and held them out.

"Watch closely." Naruto said as he focused chakra into the leaves, implementing an idea that he has had for a while now. "This technique can give you a weapon as long as you are in a forest. It's perfect for this village." He smiled. "The trick is to focus your chakra into the leaf and make it stiff. Leaves are naturally thin, so if you can make it stiff-" he paused to throw the now stiff leaf, "-Bam, instant shuriken, the Leaf Shuriken Technique."

The blonde chuckled at his follower's gaping face. The leaf was embedded up to the stem.

"Cool!" The eight year old yelled, "with this, I'll become Hokage in no time!"

That statement left him on the ground, holding his head where Naruto hit it. "Listen, there is no quick way to becoming Hokage. You have to work for it, and work hard. Practice this technique, master it, and don't let me see you until you're attacking me with leaves, got it? I expect you to be a good rival for me. Because I'm going to be Hokage.

"Anyway, this is a good move for you." The blonde added before leaving, "It even goes with your name, Konohamaru. Later." He left, knowing exactly the impact of just mentioning the smaller child by name.

A few hours later, Konohamaru hadn't even left from that spot, opting to practice the technique instead, when Ebisu showed up, looking to punish the blonde demon vessel. "Honorable Grandson, where is that boy?" He said, not even bothering to hide his anger.

"He's gone." Konohamaru panted. "I'm not allowed to see him until I can attack him with leaves."

"What? Attack with leaves? Honorable Grandson, don't be silly. Although, it's a good thing you won't be-" He was cut off by what looked to be a green shuriken passing him by. He looked to see Konohamaru holding another leaf, focusing as he threw it at Ebisu, who was struck.

"What!?" The man yelled in pain and astonishment.

"Naruto taught it to me. Cool huh?" The boy said, practically bouncing with excitement.

"That boy… Taught this… To you?" The man said. Seeing the boy's confirmative nod as he went back to hurdling leaves at the trees, the man thought, "Maybe I misjudged you – Naruto, was it?"


	5. Team Meet'n'Greet

A navy blue ninja headband loosely hung from Naruto's neck since he refused to get rid of his goggles. He chuckled at the memory as he walked to the academy.

He had just beaten Mizuki the traitor to a pulp with his shadow clones, and Iruka had graduated him – though he didn't know about the Hokage's plan to do so – by telling the boy close his eyes. Then he had taken off Naruto's goggles and had tied his own ninja headband on the boy's forehead.

Naruto had nervously thanked the man before asking, "Can I have my goggles back now? They're important." However, he hadn't bothered to elaborate on the point.

Naruto smiled at the memory before stopping at the door to the academy room. Pulling his goggles down over his eyes, he swiftly opened the door and dived into the room, yelling, "Fire in the hole!"

A bang sound resonated through the area and a flash went off, followed by smoke. No harm done, really, but the effect made it look like it.

The boy looked around the room and chuckled when he saw that everyone had, indeed, ducked under the desks. The first one up was Hinata, followed closely by Sasuke and then the rest.

They quickly spotted Naruto and started grumbling complaints.

"This is only for graduates, Naruto." Shikamaru said and then glared at the blonde for the quite literal 'Rude awakening.'

"I passed!" Naruto shouted happily as he went up to his seat beside Hinata, who smiled at him, and started to speak animatedly with her.

Another bang sounded and everyone immediately looked to Naruto, who sweat-dropped and shook his head.

Ino Yamanaka and Sakura Haruno burst into the room and towards the seat next to Sasuke, arguing all the while.

Sasuke strategically got up and left.

Naruto snickered at the scene before going back to telling Hinata, who was listening whole-heartedly, about his adventure the two nights before.

Iruka walked in and shouted for everyone to be quiet before he launched into a speech about how they were only on the bottom rung of the ninja ladder. Iruka's forehead creased and a half annoyed half constipated look appeared on his face when he realized everyone had stopped listening.

"Alright, alright, I get it, I'm boring!" The chunin yelled angrily. Everyone turned to him, "I'll cut out the speech and get straight to the team assignments, then." He sweat-dropped as, suddenly, all of the students gave him their rapt attention to him, even Shikamaru, the lazy, sleep-all-the-time kid.

"Team One," He grumbled through the teams one by one.

Naruto's attention redoubled at the sound of his name.

"Naruto Uzumaki, Sakura Haruno," The blonde noted how Sakura's head slumped in defeat and his eye twitched. "And Sasuke Uchiha. You three will be under Kakashi Hatake." He noted with equal disdain how Sakura cheered.

"Bipolar little…" Naruto grumbled, absently listening as Hinata got called for Team Eight.

After the teams were all called out, they were dismissed for a break and told to come back in an hour to meet their jonin sensei.

Naruto kissed Hinata on the cheek – a step up from hand-holding that they had made a few weeks ago – as she left to get together with her new teammates for lunch. Naruto tried to do the same, but failed.

So instead, Naruto went to Ichiraku's to wait out the hour. He spent it snacking on ramen as he tried his best to answer Ayame's questions.

When the hour was up and Naruto returned to the classroom, he saw Team Eight leaving with their sensei and waved with a smile. He went up to his seat to wait as other senseis came for their students.

And wait he did. And wait, and wait, and wait…

"Where the hell is he!?" He yelled after finally snapping.

As if by magical ninja powers, the door slid open and a white haired man with no part of his skin save his right eye visible appeared, told them to go to the roof and left.

At the roof, the three genin sat down in front of their new sensei. Naruto had cooled off a bit, and all was well.

"Okay, let's introduce ourselves, shall we?" The man said. "I'll start; My name's Kakashi Hatake. My likes are none of your business and my dislikes are of no concern to you. You don't need to know my dream, and my hobbies are for me to know." His eye curved in an upward arc as he pointed to Naruto, "Now, your turn, Blondie."

Naruto smirked and gave the speech he had been preparing for all of two seconds. "I'm Naruto Uzumaki. I like anything that appeals to me and dislike everything that invokes my ire. My hobbies include interesting things that I do, and my dream is to accomplish my goal." He said, creatively evading each question in a manner similar to Kakashi.

Said jonin glared playfully as he signaled for Sasuke to go. "My name is Sasuke Uchiha," the boy started, "I like nothing, and dislike everything else. My dream is an ambition, and my hobbies don't exist." He replied a little less than tactfully.

Sakura then went without even needing a signal. "I like… And I dislike…" Her head tilted to the side. "And my hobby is… While my dream is to… Oh, and my name is Sakura Haruno."

Kakashi looked at the trio of genin blankly, before adding, "Well, now that we've each given detailed descriptions on who we are, what makes us tick, and how we think with those in depth speech on our very souls, let's move on to more important business. You're not genin yet."

The collective "What?" was so predictable that it was almost scary.

"You have to take a second genin test. The first one was to see who has the chance to become genin. The second one is to make sure that you qualify for really being ninja." The Cyclops elaborated. "Now, for a few warnings. One, failure rate is sixty-six percent."

"Gasp!"

"Two, the test will be tough, don't eat or you might throw up."

"Gasp!"

"Three, the test is survival training, so you'll need to –"

"Gasp!"

"Naruto, stop that!"

"Sorry, Sensei."

The man in question grumbled, "Just meet at the bridge by Training Ground Seven at seven tomorrow morning." And then he left via pseudo-teleportation.

"Well, that was fun." Naruto deadpanned before leaving, followed by his teammates. He then paused, remembering something, "Wait. How do we go through survival training without eating breakfast? We'll be hungry and low on energy." He said before leaving Sasuke and Sakura to think on that, hoping that they got it.

But, for now, he needed to go home and get ready for the Bell Test.


	6. A Look into the Life

"Think, Naruto, think!" A whiskered face frowned as he walked around. "You need to have breakfast – that's a given – but how to convince them?" He was, of course, referring to his teammates. They were advised – he refused to acknowledge it as a real order, no matter what – to not eat, but his teammates did not know that, so he had to convince them. They needed to have energy for the upcoming test, plus it would build bonds. Weak bonds, probably, but bonds nonetheless.

He looked at the sun's position and sighed.

"Guess I should get going." The boy thought to himself as he walked toward the training ground. "A couple more years and I'll be fifteen again. Finally, I'm tired of pretending." He groaned. "Being a little kid again was fun and all – especially with learning to be a freaking ninja, of all things – but it'll be great to be my real age; that is, if you don't count the years that I've lived in this world.

"Still, I guess I should make the most of being thirteen. You can only abuse being a minor so much. Although, it definitely helps that the Hokage is soft on me.

"And the pranks have been fun, too. But most importantly, there's Hinata. In a couple of years, she'll be fifteen, too. Then I can date her without feeling like a pedophile – even though the distance is only two years now, and for that matter, didn't really exist in the first place. Gosh this is confusing.

"At least I got out of the boring hellhole that was my previous life… Now I don't have to worry about all the boredom that comes with living in the country or the stress of living in the city. And as an added bonus, I've made way more friends here, anyway. I also don't have to worry about my parents –

"Wait! Shit, to Mom and dad, I must've been gone for years with no explanation. Damn it! How do I even get back? This is bad!

"Wait… Come to think of it, this show is supposed to take place in Japan, right? Why does everyone speak English? I'm so confused…

"Enough of that, though. It's not important. How in the hell do I get back? What happens if I die in this world, for that matter? I'm a ninja in _Naruto_, there's a good chance I'll die! And if I do, then Orochimaru – or Kabuto or whoever –might reanimate me! What'll I do then?

"Well, the obvious… I'd get enslaved…

"But, wait, I'm the protagonist now! The Chosen One! The Hero of Konoha! I can't die!

"Then again, I am Konoha's Number One Unpredictable Ninja… So I could surprise myself and die after all.

"Man, this crap makes my head hurt. I hate dimensional travel…

"Hmm… I'm Naruto Uzumaki, so eventually, I'll need to learn Rasengan, which I might be able to start now, since I know the details… For that matter, I've been excelling in Fuinjutsu, maybe I can learn Hiraishin.

"I can't wait for that to happen! I really want to learn that! Boy, now I'm pumped!

"But first, the Bell Test. Hell yeah! This is going to be so fun!

"Okay, To Do List is as follows:

Don't let Kakashi give you a Thousand Years of Death. That's definitely given.

Eat breakfast. Check, convince Sasuke and Sakura to eat as well. Will do. Kakashi's always late, anyway.

Build bonds. Harder, but doable. I need to establish Teamwork.

Make sure that we're reay for the chunin –

"Damn it! Orochimaru! Sasuke leaves for Orochimaru! How will I stop that? Okay, calm down. Nip it in the bud, that's what you'll do. Just make sure Sasuke doesn't get the Curse Seal in the first place.

"Ugh, maybe my old life wasn't so bad after all… At least I don't have to worry about life-or-death situations there.

"… Well, there was that time with the bank robber and the hostages, but everyone made it out alive and nothing happened since. But this is an anime cartoon. One that focuses specifically on elite combat-capable kids of all things!

"Man, I can't wait for the filler…" The blonde boy groaned as he concluded his mental situation analysis.

"What's wrong with you?" A familiar monotone voice asked, successfully eliciting a yelp from the blonde who then promptly jumped out of his skin. The dark-haired boy stared at him for a moment. "Dumbass."

"Love you, too, Buddy Ole Pal." The whiskered boy replied sarcastically. He had decided long ago not to call Sasuke by the ever-so-loving name, "Bastard," because he figured that wouldn't help him to build a positive relationship. For similar reasons, he didn't reply with "Duck-ass" either.

Sakura's fists had nothing to do with it, he told himself.

Speaking of, the pink haired girl arrived a few minutes later. Immediately going up to Sasuke and doing what she does best – fan-girling.

"We're definitely going to have to something about that." Naruto thought as he felt a presence of a certain aloof, lightning-using, white-haired, masked, self-pity-wallowing Cyclops.

"Kakashi? You're early," Naruto declared in surprise. His surprise, however, paled in comparison to the man's though.

"Found out so quickly? I just got here… In fact, how did he even sense me? Is he a sensor-type?" Kakashi thought as he fell – Gracefully, he would claim – from his hiding spot. "Now I can't use the excuse I was working on, Obito would have been proud, too."

"Ahem, yes. Very good detection skills, Naruto. So, as for the test," The man held up two silver bells on red strings for the team-to-be to see. "To pass, you must get one of these bells from me. Don't get one, don't pass; Got it?"

"But, Sensei, there are only two bells," Sakura declared, "And there are three of us."

"Then I guess one of you will definitely fail, then – or two, or even all three. Oh, and whoever does fail will be tied to a post and go without lunch. You have until noon." The man said offhandedly as he pulled out and fiddled with an alarm clock. "And remember: Come at me with the intent to kill, or you won't be able to get a bell."

The blonde instantly launched himself at the man with a kunai in hand.

"Don't get impatient." The man said airily, "I haven't even said 'Go.'"

"You just did." The Naruto replied before poofing out of existence, proving that the boy had left a shadow clone in his place and was now who-knows-where.

"Hmm, clever. Well, I guess we should start." Said the teacher.

"Let the games begin."


	7. How to Pass the Bell Test

_Yeah, I skipped the actual testing part. So, sue me. My story, that means I can do whatever I want. And considering the whole point of this story was to put together all my favorite couples WHILE Naruto became reasonably strong, I'm doing just that. Because I'm just that awesome. Besides, I'm sure that this idea is original; and I have an excuse for Naruto to know what's going to happen without this being time travel or psychic Naruto._

…_Why am I telling you this? I'm sure that you don't care._

_So, yeah, skipping to the end of the Bell Test._

"Well, that could have gone better." Naruto thought as he struggled against the ropes that held him to the post.

"Do you three know the true meaning of the test?" Kakashi asked somewhat angrily. The trio of genin looked at him. "Teamwork! Why do you think we operate in four-man cells? So we can-"

"You're an idiot." Naruto said suddenly.

Kakashi glared, "I'm a what?"

"An idi-"

"I heard you. Why do you say that?" Kakashi asked more angrily than before.

"Because you expect us to work together," Naruto said. He purposely waited for Kakashi to prepare to speak before continuing with, "The loner," The blonde looked at Sasuke, "The fangirl," he looked at Sakura, "And the dead-last?" He looked back to Kakashi as he referred to himself.

"Everyone knows that these two hate me," He went on before anyone could object, "And Sakura annoys the hell out of Sasuke," Naruto didn't even bother to acknowledge Sakura's hitting him. "Sasuke practically hates everything… Except for Tomatoes…" He added, "And I don't like them too much yet, because we've only been a team for a day, we've hardly interacted during the Academy, and on top of that, they're cranky because you tricked them into not eating then decided to be early so that I couldn't trick them into not not eating!

"How could this team possibly function!?" Naruto finished as he thrashed around and broke out of the ropes.

Kakashi gaped at the boy as he thought on what he said. "That… Is very true…" He thought. Naruto brought the man out of his musing, "Hmm, what'd you say, Naruto?"

"I said I'm going to go see how Hinata did on her test!" Naruto snapped forcefully. He then added in his thoughts, "Impromptu get-a-clue speech, check; awesome exit, check." He smirked inwardly as he stormed off.

"Wait!" Kakashi shouted, "Come back here so you three can try again!"

Naruto couldn't stop himself from face-planting. "You mean… You're actually going to give me another shot after that speech." "Well, that went way better than expected," He mused.

"Yeah. You see, you don't have to like each other, just show you can work together. So you three just eat up, chat for a bit, and then, in about an hour, you'll try again. Got it?" Kakashi said. Not waiting for an answer, the man leapt over the trees to report to the Hokage.

"I call the lunchbox with the tomatoes…" Sasuke said suddenly after a few moments of silence.

_After the team-to-be ate, they chatted for the rest of the hour. And then, this happened._

"Okay, I'm back. Now, let's begin-" Kakashi started.

Naruto immediately lunged at the man and showed off a taijutsu style that looked familiar, but not with the blonde using it. When Kakashi was about to land a hit, the blonde blurred for a bit before evading impossibly and using a completely different style, one that was much more spontaneous and much less graceful.

After a few minutes of this process repeating, Kakashi finally jumped away from the blonde and at Sakura. Sasuke jumped forward to protect and started with a sloppy shuriken throw.

Kakashi's eye narrowed at the raven haired boy, and he caught the shuriken, which poofed away, revealing a second Sakura, who hit him in the face before jumping back.

A demon-wind shuriken flew at Kakashi from behind, where Naruto was, and he turned around to see Sasuke. One of the Sakuras stayed back to watch while the other helped surround him along with the Sasuke and the Naruto.

Kakashi's mind was reeling and using up time that he didn't have as the three genin that surrounded him jumped toward him. Sakura blurred and executed a graceful roundhouse kick that barely missed Kakashi' face.

Naruto attempted a spinning axe kick, but missed by a slim margin. He then blurred and threw a batch of shuriken and kunai at the sensei before blurring again and performing the shuriken shadow clone technique.

"What's… Going… On?" Kakashi thought frantically as he hastily revealed his sharingan, hoping to at least stall Sasuke for a few precious moments.

That's when he caught it. Sakura froze for an instant and blurred, but that wasn't what caught his eye. What caught his eye was the tell-tale sign of the slightest wisp of smoke coming from the girl's 'body.'

"Serial substitution. Sasuke is hiding out somewhere in the bushes, and Naruto's clones are transformed into his teammates. They did this before I got back, and executed their plan nigh flawlessly. Even to the point of Sakura's sucker punch." He winced internally and the thought. "Sasuke is substituting in and out of the fray to catch me off guard. Amazing plan…" His thoughts trailed off as he looked down at his genin, who had been floored during his musing.

He had eliminated the shadow clones and beaten the three down with little effort once he had unveiled his sharingan.

"Nice try – good plan, too – but looks like you lose. So, who came up with that plan?"

"I came up with the three-on-one-substitution part," Sakura said.

"I did the clones transformed and the sucker punch part." Sasuke added.

Naruto smirked and said, "And I came up with the get-clones-to-substitue-with-the-bells-before-the- fight-even-starts part."

"Hmm… Good plan- Wait, the 'what' part, Naruto? I have the bells right… Oh." Kakashi said as he looked down and his waist band, which was now bell free.

Two clones came out of the forest holding the two bells and Kakashi said, "Wow. Amazing… And you obviously showed good teamwork… So, I guess you guys pass…" He added mentally, "At least I didn't lose in an embarrassing way, like them bluffing about using the ending to my new _Make-Out Paradise_ or something…" He chuckled as he watched the three genin – his team – walked away.

"What an odd group," Kakashi mused aloud when Sakura punched Naruto who laughed as Sasuke said something.


	8. Early Missions

Over the next few weeks of boring chores as Team Seven, said team had bonded. But, between a chronically late sensei, boring missions and hardcore training, how could you not. They often had to rely on each other just to get home.

They were become above average in most fields fairly quickly. Sakura was learning extra medical ninjutsu, Sasuke was slightly specializing in weaponry, and Naruto was going far with seals.

Whether that last one was because of NAruto being an Uzumaki, his love for puzzles and codes in _his_ life, or both, he didn't know, nor did he care.

Anyway, now Team Seven was on another, special mission.

"Ducktail is in position." A slightly static-y monotone voice said over the radio.

"Cherry Blossom is in position." A higher voice said afterwards.

"Whiskers is in position. I'm ready." A third voice said.

The white-haired man that was listening to the three voices nodded before tapping the button, "Go, now!"

Three forms jumped out of the bushes and leapt onto their target. The mighty beast put up a good fight.

Sakura punched the behemoth in the gut as Sasuke sent several shuriken and kunai into its back. Naruto placed a restraint seal on the thing, but it broke free.

It swiped at Naruto, sending the boy flying towards a tree, but Sasuke was quick to intersect him. The pair then tag-teamed the beast with an elegant-spontaneous combination before jumping back as Sakura kicked the mighty beast forward a few feet.

Sasuke launched a few more shuriken, and they embedded themselves into the behemoth's face as the thing lurched forward.

Sasuke and Naruto immediately restrained it with ninja wire and restraint seals respectively, and then Sakura came up from behind to knock the thing out completely.

"If only," Naruto sighed as Sasuke confirmed to Kakashi that this was indeed the cat that they were looking for.

"Mission: Find Lost Pet Tora – Success."

"That beast is evil!" Naruto said hotly as he and the rest of Team Seven walked through the Hokage Tower.

"That may be so, but it still belongs to the Fire Lord's wife." Kakashi replied casually.

A brief thought of Ursa having a cat ran through Naruto's mind before it was overran by the observation that Kakashi did not disagree with him.

He slowed down in his walking a bit, as did Sakura and Sasuke, so that Kakashi was ahead of the three. The trio signaled to one another before nodding. The plan was set.

They walked into the Hokage Office for another mission.

The genin didn't even exchange glances this time before they simultaneously said, "We want a C-Rank now."

Naruto continued, "These aren't even real missions, just chores that a civilian could do."

Sasuke took up, "I think we've proven that we can successfully work together, and these odd jobs are not improving our skill at all."

"We even hold the record for time taken catching Tora. Beating our own time is the only way to improve with these missions." Sakura added. Everyone glanced at the clock which told them that they only took two hours, thirty-seven minutes and eleven seconds that last time.

"We're more than ready." The three said simultaneously again.

"I think they are." Kakashi added.

_After a brief amount of arguing, this transpired._

"Come on in, Tazuna." Hiruzen said.

An old man holding a bottle of what everyone presumed to be some sort of alcoholic beverage entered and said, "I paid for ninjas to protect me, not some kids. The short one doesn't even-"

He was cut off when another Naruto – courtesy of the shadow clone technique – stood behind him with the bottle at his throat. The boy glared at the man and whispered, "You paid for a C-Rank mission, so you get C-Rank ninja." He emphasized the "C-Rank" part and made sure not to let Kakashi hear them.

Even as Kakashi pulled Naruto away and apologized for that little episode, Tazuna knew he was caught.

"Okay, Team," Kakashi said after scolding Naruto, "Tomorrow we head out. Meet at the gate tomorrow morning at eight sharp."

"Tomorrow at noon got it." Naruto said as he walked off. Tazuna looked at the boy as Kakashi shook his head. Sasuke and Sakura snickered.

_Tomorrow at noon…_

The gang waved at Kotetsu and Izumo, the chunin gate-keepers, as they headed out of the village for their first C-Rank mission.

"If you were a jonin, why were you four hours late?" Tazuna asked the white-haired man.

"Ooh, I got this one," Naruto jumped in front of them, "You were saving a tree from a cat, weren't you? Or this time, was it a ninja being attacked by old ladies and you had to save it." The blonde said while smirking.

Kakashi groaned as he was reminded of the other few times where he messed up his excuses. Naruto always was trying to bring them up.

"Actually, this time, a little girl fell on a big rock and I had to – wait… Damn it!" Kakashi groaned – louder this time – as Naruto laughed at his expense. His talent was slipping ever since Naruto started finishing his sentences.

He never really paid attention to what he said, so when Naruto started saying it for him, and messing him up, it really threw the man off his game.

Kakashi chased Naruto for a bit before they settled down and the group started chatting aimlessly. It was the normal stuff – the meaning of life, why the sky is blue, how they would hate to be watching a Mermaid Melody fandub – boring stuff like that.

They wlked for a while until they finally caught up with the plot and came up to a puddle.

"Ooh! A puddle!" Naruto shouted gleefully. "I'm going to go splash in it!" He told his team before running forwards.

Kakashi tried to stop the boy, but to no avail. He thought, "A puddle… When it hasn't rained in weeks? Amateurs…"

Naruto jumped high and landed right in the middle of the puddle before doing so again. He repeated the process until the genjutsu dispelled on its own and the demon brothers came out.

"What the hell?" Gozu said as he rubbed the already forming bruises.

"What was that, you brat?" Meizu said while holding his head.

"Hi!" Naruto said, keeping up his "I'm an idiot so kill me!" act. "My name's Naruto Uzumaki. Why were you hiding in that puddle?"

The two men froze at the boy's surname. Uzumaki – seal specialists; prankster extraordinaires; reall powerful ninja; and all-around bad-asses, what with their creativity and high vitality rates.

"Well, it was nice meeting you, Uzumaki, sir." Meizu said cautiously. "But I'm afraid we should get going, I mean, we must have been napping for quite a while if it's about noon."

Gozu quickly caught on, "Yes, we should get back to our journey."

The two high-tailed it like bats out of hell and Naruto nearly lost it. In between the chuckles that managed to escape, he stated, "Ah, mist ninja. So afraid of an Uzumaki."

"Why were they afraid?" Sakura asked.

"Because," Naruto said, calmer but still smiling, "For a little more than fifty years now, there has been a standing 'Flee-on-sight' order in the mist for any and all Uzumaki. Poor nuts."

"You're an Uzumaki?" Tazuna asked carefully.

"One of the few left." Came the reply.

"I'm glad you're on my side." The old man said as they continued on their merry way.


	9. Everybody's Ninja Fighting

Kakashi started talking with Tazuna about why there were missing ninja after him.

"Wait, what was that?" Sasuke asked as the adults and Naruto continued walking.

"What was what?" Naruto answered while looking back, "Hey, are you guys coming?"

It was Sakura who replied as the two started walking again, "Yeah, but why did they run away?"

"I said it earlier. The entire Uzumaki family has a 'Flee-on-sight' order placed on them in the Land of Water and surrounding areas."

"Yeah, but why?" Sasuke asked again.

Naruto glanced at Tazuna, who was really tensing up at the conversation, and came back to Sasuke and Sakura to whisper. "The Uzumakis were famous world-wide for being seal-masters and having high vitality rates; however, in the island countries, like the Land of Whirlpools was, the Uzumakis were more famous. This is because the Uzumakis were especially sadistic towards the people geological close to them."

"'Sadistic'? What do you mean?" Sakura warily questioned.

Naruto glanced back at Tazuna before whispering some things to Sasuke and Sakura. With each thing he whispered, their faces grew more and more horrified.

"They really…" Sasuke said, "With a fishing rod? … And salsa?" Naruto nodded, "But not the sugar, right?" The blonde nodded again.

Sakura's face paled, "You mean they actually… Is that even possible!?"

Naruto nodded with a happy smile on his face.

Sasuke and Sakura looked at each other and shivered before simultaneously saying, "What happens to the parrots?"

Naruto laughed.

Kakashi turned around as his conversation with Tazuna ended, "Okay, Team, looks like this is actually an A-Ranked mission, so we should head back."

"But we're not going to, right?" Naruto asked, "We want to go, right guys?" Sasuke and Sakura nodded, "See? We want to go. We can handle it."

After a little more persuading, Kakashi sighed and the group continued onwards.

_Later on, this event occurred._

The group was walking along merrily until they came to the river where the rower was. At that time, they started floating merrily.

Once they got to the other side and the rower took off, the band of ninja, and Tazuna, kept walking until Naruto suddenly threw a random kunai at the bushes.

Out of those very same bushes, came a white rabbit.

"Naruto!" Sakura yelled, "Don't scare me like that!"

"Right, because you were okay with the Uzumaki tales…" He muttered. He then added aloud. "I'm so sorry for almost hitting you, poor little white rabbit. What with your white fur. Here in late springtime. In the Land of Fire. Where it never snows…" He kept on drawling on his facts while looking at Kakashi, who was staring at him lazily.

The sentences kept coming, "When rabbits usually have brown fur… Because it's spring… Unless the rabbit was house raised… Like they would be if used for a substitution…" He stressed his last word as Kakashi's eye widened.

"Everyone get down!" Kakashi shouted as he tackled Tazuna.

"About time." Naruto though angrily as he watched the spinning chunk of super sharp metal embed itself in a tree.

Zabuza, a hidden mist missing ninja – also one of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist – who had no shirt and gray pajama pants that poofed out a little, landed on the sword.

"Hi, Zabuza!" Naruto yelled, successfully making the man in question lose his footing before said man reapplied chakra to his feet.

"What is it, Brat?" The eyebrow-less man asked angrily.

"I was wondering if you knew where Kisame was!" Naruto answered.

This time, Zabuza really did lose his footing, and landed face down on the dirt road. He stood up and grabbed his sword before replying, "How do you know who Kisame is?"

"Bingo book." Naruto replied simply, "Now, where is he?"

"Well, what the hell kind of a question is that? I haven't seen Kisame in ages."

Naruto absentmindedly noted Kakashi and the rest's stunned silence as he continued, "But you've had to at least hear some rumors or something, right?"

"Well, he was spotted at Tanzaku Gai a few days ago with a – Wait, why am I telling you this? Just hand over the old man!"

Kakashi snapped out of his trance at this, as did the rest, and he stepped up, "We will not hand over the old man."

Naruto had backed off and tuned out the dialogue as he spread out his senses to find Haku. He silently made a shadow clone that sneaked out of the fray with a map. He had super charged it so that it could last a good while.

Naruto tuned back in as a mist and a powerful killer aura seeped on to the battle field. The clone ran off to find Tanzaku Gai and to ask around for the fish-man.

He listened to the clashing metal and different curses as he followed the fight with his chakra sensory perception.

He felt the presence of the bad guy right beside him and swiftly substituted himself with the super bridge builder.

He bit back a forceful cry of agony as he felt the blade connect and went flying towards a tree.

Zabuza briefly noted that he didn't hit the bridge builder as Kakashi attacked him again and pushed him away from the genin.

Sasuke and Sakura were freaking out at the sight of Naruto, before their attention was pulled back to Kakashi, who was flying through the air towards the river.

He landed in the water with a heavy splash as Zabuza came up to him and trapped him in a water prison technique.

A cracking sound was heard, and everyone looked over to see that a branch had fallen near where Naruto collided with the tree. The blonde was no longer in sight.

"You can't… Keep me… Down…" Naruto said as he thought, "Damn… This hurts…" He grinned as best as he could towards the missing ninja.

"How are you still alive?" Zabuza asked with shock written all over his face and chest and arms and every else except for his right pinky toe.

He barely managed to pick out the words "Uzuamki," "Die," and "Ramen," before the boy stumbled a bit and rushed him.

Naruto reached into his bloody jacket and pulled out a special seal as Kurama's chakra seeped into the wound and sped up the healing process.

"This was not supposed to happen." Naruto thought as the adrenaline in his system numbed the pain enough for him to think.

He attached the little tag to a kunai and threw it at Zabuza.

"An explosive tag?" Zabuza thought, "But he'll kill his sensei. He wouldn't."

The tag started burning and Zabuza decided not to take the chance. He jumped away with all his might the tag finished burning.

Naruto, who hadn't even stopped running, tackled Kakashi into the water as a poisonous gas filled the immediate area.

Kakashi, mind whirling, caught on and quickly dragged Naruto, whose consciousness was rapidly fading, to land, where Zabuza was about to attack the bridge builder again.

The white-haired man closed his eye as Obito's sharingan took over his sight completely. He quickly pseudo-teleport tackled Tazuna and high tailed it out of there.

Sasuke and Sakura jumped back in shock at all the events, and on whim, hurled three kunai each into the missing ninja's stomach. Just as Kakashi returned to finish the man off, three needles sank into the already floored man's neck.

The mist steadily cleared as a young boy with a mist hunter ninja mask dropped down in front of them.

"Thank you for your assistance. We have been tracking this man for a long time, and now we finally have him." He said before flickering away with the body.

Kakashi promptly fell unconscious.

After bandaging the wounds to stop blood flow, Sasuke carried Naruto and Tazuna carried Kakashi – both piggy-back style – to Tazuna's house.

Once there, Sasuke, Sakura and Tazuna collapsed in both mental and physical exhaustion and reflected on the events that took place just now.


	10. Training Well, We Would Be

_Sorry I'm late, I got lost on the road of life._

"Listen," Kakashi said seriously as he looked at his genin. He was still facing chakra exhaustion from the battle the day before, but Naruto's wound had healed up nicely. He pinned that little bit to the fox as he continued, "Zabuza is still alive."

"Gasp!" Naruto yelled dramatically. "Sorry." He muttered when Kakashi let loose a fierce glare.

"So what do we do?" Sakura asked with a voice full of worry.

"We train." Kakashi replied simply as he reached for his crutches. "We will be climbing trees."

There was a riveting silence.

"How is that training?" Sasuke asked.

"Because you will be doing it without using your hands." Kakashi replied. "Watch," He added as he walked right up the tree, keeping his body parallel to the ground. "All you have to do is focus chakra to your feet, and you will stick to the tree. Too much chakra and it'll push you off, but too little and you won't stick. Use kunai to mark your progress… Uh, I think that's it. Go on, now." Kakashi finished lazily and walked back to the house.

"This is easy!" Sakura shouted happily as she sat on a limb of the tree before Kakashi even got five feet away.

"Yeah, I know." Naruto smirked as he sat on a limb, actually shocking his white-haired sensei.

"So, what's next?" Sasuke asked the masked man as he stood on a limb and leaned on the trunk.

"How did you…?" Kakashi trailed off, not finishing the obvious question.

"Naruto thought we should learn it earlier, so a few weeks ago, we got together to learn it." Sakura explained as the three genin walked down their respective trees.

"All by yourselves?" Kakashi asked in shock.

"Never underestimate my ability to sneak into anywhere." Naruto said proudly. "Even though I didn't need to sneak into anywhere since I already knew how to do it…" He added mentally.

"We know the water walking technique, too." Sasuke said.

"Incredible." Kakashi replied. "Well, I'm not prepared for this, so we'll start training tomorrow." He added in a voice filled with wonder and pride.

The blonde of the group ran off into the woods before he could be followed.

"Finally, peace and quiet to really get working." He thought as he unsealed water balloons from a scroll. Grabbing two, he held them in front of himself, "Which to start with, left hand, or right?" He wondered silently.

After a brief moment of thought, he decided on right. He gripped the red liquid filled balloon in his right hand and focused chakra into his palm and through the rubber exterior.

Once the chakra was inserted into the liquid-filled ball, he started spinning it in one uniform direction, rapidly accelerating the flow. Then he changed the direction of the chakra and forced it to spin in multiple directions at once, creating a maelstrom inside the sphere.

Bumps appeared on the outside of the ball, making the designs distort and deform as the water inside forced the balloon to morph.

With a sudden burst, the balloon popped, water, chakra and rubber flying in a directions as a stunned blonde boy stared at his palm in wonder and amazement.

"One try," He muttered. He blinked before coming out of his trance and yelling, "One try!"

Hearing his voice echo slightly and spreading his senses for any possible onlookers, he decided to be a little quieter.

"That is so easy when you know exactly what you have to do." Naruto stated, voice filled to the brim with fascination as he repeated the process with his left hand and received similar results.

Then a thought dawned on him.

"I bought all of these water balloons for nothing. Damn," He sealed them away before bringing out the rubber balls he had also gotten.

"Let's see, this one just needs more power…" He muttered mentally as he placed the sphere in his right hand.

_Meanwhile, at the bridge, this was going on._

It was Sakura's turn to watch the bridge-builder, just in case.

"Rock, paper, scizzors, go!" Sakura and Tazuna yelled after he started his break.

"Ha! I win!" The old man said as he held his flat hand in front of Sakura's fist.

Sakura hung her head in despair as she muttered, "That's the eighteenth game I've lost to you guys." She looked up and added determinedly, "I will win against one of you."

_In the forest again._

"So step two is also remarkably easier if you don't have to figure it out; that kind of takes the fun out of it." He thought to himself as he examined the scorch marks that his chakra had made on his palm.

"Step three: control. Maybe this one will be difficult." He picked up a water balloon as he said this, offhandedly thinking that he was going to use them after all. "If I remember correctly, you need control to form the chakra into a dense, rapidly spinning perfect sphere so as to not pop the balloon. This will make it self-sustaining – or something like that – and more stable, to avoid backlash. Since I don't feel like nearly tearing my arm apart, lack of backlash is good."

His internal monologue ended and the boy focused chakra into the balloon before divert its flow into many directions. The balloon popped almost immediately.

"Damn," Naruto muttered as he shook the stinging pain from his hand and continued to train.

_The very next morning, this took place._

Naruto lay on the ground, out cold, when a young person came up to him.

"Wake up," The person said while shaking Naruto.

Naruto yawned and stretched as he groggily sat up, taking note of a feminine figure – Haku.

Haku watched the boy wake up and absently noted the severe chakra burns that were quickly healing on his hands.

"Are you okay? You shouldn't sleep out here, or you'll catch a cold. And those burns on your hand look bad." She said.

"I'll be fine. But thanks for waking me up, my teammates are probably worried." The blonde said, getting up. Before the girl could ask her question, he walked away and added, "Oh, and Haku, tell Zabuza that I can't wait to see how he fairs against an Uzumaki in our next fight."

The blonde boy winked before darting away, leaving a stunned and now afraid Haku behind.

"I've got to report this to Master Zabuza!" Haku said, dashing at full speed toward their secret base.


	11. New Slaves and a New Jinchuuriki

_Taking It Easy is BACK ONLINE! YAY!_

_Sorry, but I broke my computer and had to get a new one; but the point is, I'M BACK, BABY!_

We left off at Naruto meeting Haku. And for the record, this is kind of a parody, just one that doesn't make fun of the obvious stuff. I didn't start that way, but that's what it became. Do y'all want me to continue this way or try to make it serious?

_Here we go!_

"… What?" The blue-eyed, blonde boy asked lamely. It had been a couple of weeks since the first meeting with Zabuza. He had made lots of progress – both with the Rasengan, and with team bonding; the team actually new about each other's hobbies now.

The masked man sighed, "I said, 'I want you to let Haku and I come back with you to Konoha as your servants to settle the debt I owe to the Uzumaki clan.'" He repeated.

"Right, right… But, what debt?" Naruto inquired tentatively.

Zabuza groaned, "For the last time, shortly after the _Bingo Book_ put the 'Flee-on-Sight' order on the entire Uzumaki clan, the Momochi clan got into trouble with some Samurai. They outnumbered, outgunned, and totally outclassed. Then the 'Red-Hot Habanero,' Kushina Uzumaki, came to our aid. By reputation alone, she dwindled the number to a measly couple dozen; then, she showed off a little and nearly created a tsunami with that crazy slashing technique of hers, and scared the rest of the samurai away.

"Kushina saved our butts from getting slaughtered, so almost all of us owe her our life. I thought that debt ended when she died, but if you're an Uzumaki – her son, no less – then I need to pay you the multiple life debts."

"Right…" Naruto said slowly, processing all of the information. He had never even considered that this would happen. Suddenly, his face adorned a big grin, "Okay, then, come on!"

"Wait, wait, wait," Sakura said, stepping up, "They were hired by a cold-hearted tyrannical businessman, and were dead-set on killing us only three days ago, and now they're coming home with us to be your servants?"

"Looks like it." Naruto said happily.

"Okay… Just wanted to clarify that." The pinkette girl replied as she stepped back with Sasuke again.

"I can't believe this is really happening." Sasuke muttered to himself as Kakashi spoke to Zabuza.

_At Konoha…_

"That's right, they will be staying here as my servants." Naruto repeated to the Hokage as if everything were right with the world.

Hiruzen looked to Kakashi, who shrugged, as if to say, "I have no idea, just roll with it."

"Okay, then. And you said your names were Zabuza and Haku Momochi, right?" The old man asked.

"Correct, sir." Haku said as she bowed respectfully.

Hiruzen nodded and wrote the names down before saying, "Got it. Okay, then, Naruto, take them to your apartment, I guess. Sasuke, Sakura, you two may also go home. Kakashi, if you'd stay a while to discuss important matters." The white-haired ninja nodded an imperceptive nod as the others left.

"Okay, everyone else can come in now!" Hiruzen called out.

Numerous jonin sensei, exam proctors and chunin entered the room.

"As you all know, it's time for the Chunin Exams. You know the drill, Jonin, if you want to enter your team, speak up." Hiruzen said as he readied himself to fill out various forms and documents.

A moment of silence passed before Kakashi Hatake stepped forward, saying, "I guess I'll start off. Kakashi Hatake entering Team Seven – Naruto Uzumaki, Sakura Haruno, and Sasuke Uchiha."

"What?!" Iruka objected, "Sir, with all due respect," He was speaking to the Hokage now, "I know those three students and-"

"Iruka, these students learning tree-walking and water-walking by themselves. Back in Wave Country, I had to teach them each a technique as well as improve on their supplementary skills, because I had nothing else I could teach them.

"Sasuke has really improved teamwork-wise, as well as in the weapons field. Sakura is a better-than-fair medical ninja. And Naruto… Well, Naruto, I couldn't really teach him anything with his specialty, seals, because he has already surpassed me.

"In fact, I feel that Naruto is a seal specialist rivalling Jiraiya himself."

The rest of the room's occupants gasped before Kakashi continued.

"The three of them are above average at Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, and Taijutsu – Yes, even Naruto – and their teamwork is some of the best I've seen, despite our rocky start.

"I have a feeling that these three will be the next Legendary Three – Naruto will probably become Hokage, Sasuke will lead the ANBU, and Sakura will be the head medic.

"Not to mention, the three will stay together, and Naruto, being Naruto, will stay here and keep the other two from ever going rogue. They are more than ready for these exams, both in mind, and in body." The masked man finished.

As an afterthought, he added, "Plus, they have Zabuza who will training them with sword-fighting a bit, too."

The rest were so dumbfounded that they completely forgot their reason for being there, only to be reminded when Hiruzen asked, "so, team Seven. Now, who else?"

_On the streets of Konoha._

"Well, now I have a shadow clone giving Zabuza and Haku the tour, and Hinata's on a mission, so you guys are stuck me. What do you want to do?" Naruto asked cheerfully. "Want to go get some ramen?" He added hopefully.

"No," Sasuke said as the group mindlessly rounded a corner, "We had to live off of your cup ramen for the whole trip back from-" He was cut off as he blindly walked into a person.

The raven-head started to apologize before the other boy, wearing a cat-suit with a mummy on his back, roughly grabbed him by the front of his shirt and lifted him off of the ground.

"Watch where you're going, punk!" The taller boy shouted in Sasuke's face. Naruto recognized him as Kankuro.

"Kankuro," the cat-boy's female companion, Temari, called out, "Stop playing around or Gaara will be pissed."

Meanwhile, Naruto was having a conversation Kurama.

"What do you mean, 'One-tail'?" The fox inquired.

"Gaara is the host of the one-tailed Tanuki, Shukaku. And he's here for the Chunin exams. Now will you lend me chakra whenever I want it?"

"No! You're not even the boy I was sealed in!" The malicious voice responded, the muzzle that accompanied it gesturing to a stone carving of Naruto – the _real_ Naruto. "Why should I help you?"

Naruto, who had _his_ brown hair and black eyes, glared at the fox boldly, answering, "Because there's nothing else to do in this dump! You're not using the energy! Why let something that incredible go to waste?"

The fox spat on the boy before shoving him out of his mindscape.

Back in the real world, Naruto held his head due to the minor headache as he noticed that the conversation had progressed. Now Gaara was asking Sasuke of his name.

"Damn it," Naruto thought, "I zoned out, and now I have no idea what happened."

"Hey, you." Naruto said, referring to the redhead with the gourd on his back – Gaara. "You're different." He stated bluntly.

"Who are you?" The cold voice asked.

"Naruto Uzumaki," The blonde replied. "Nine." He said mysteriously.

The four non-demon-hosts were lost as Gaara's eyes widened.

"And you're One, right?" Naruto asked, losing Sasuke and Sakura further; however, when Gaara nodded, Temari and Kankuro caught on to what they were talking about. Their faces paled as they realized the trouble this could cause.

Naruto added, "You should ditch the snake and join the fox." Before he pulled away, he made to drag his teammates with him.

As an afterthought, as he rounded the corner again, he called out, "See you in the exams."

_Okay, so they've met Gaara. Whoo!_


	12. Adventures of a Naruto Clone

_This might be a little short because in this chapter, it shows the events of Naruto's shadow clone._

Naruto dashed through the trees as he headed away from the fray. He heard the telltale signs of battle grow more and more distant as he went on.

He went all out, running as fast as he could without using chakra, on his trip to Tanzaku Gai.

"I got to find Itachi." He repeatedly muttered to himself, so as to not forget his mission.

He stopped for a split-second to glance at the map before dashing off again, this time in a slightly different direction.

He absently noted that he had left the forest and prepared himself to run on water to cross back into Fire Country.

He nimbly leaned down as he ran and scooped a fish right out of the water as he kept running over the waves.

Looking to his right, he just barely saw what should have been the ruins of the Land of Whirlpools – his ancestral homeland – on the horizon.

Redoubling his focus he gobbled down his fish and picked up the pace a little bit before sending a burst of chakra through his legs and leaping over the final stretch of water.

Creating a quick shadow clone to help soften the landing, the first shadow clone starting running across the land before jumping back into the trees and cutting down his chakra usage again.

"I got to find Itachi." He said lowly again as he dashed into a random village and practically soared across the rooftops.

Upon leaving the village, Naruto took out his map again and adjusted his course accordingly.

When he finally reached Tanzaku Gai, he pulled a little tag out of his shirt and pulled chakra that original had stored prior out of it.

Now refueled, the clone walked through the village.

A man wearing a trench coat and fedora with a mask covering his face, along with a bandolier with many various knives was leaning against the walls in a shadowy ally.

"He looks trustworthy." Naruto said as he walked up to him.

"Excuse me, sir," the blonde said, gaining the man's attention, "But I'm looking for some friends of mine. One's tall and blue and has a bandaged sword on his back. He looks like a fish. The other one is a slightly shorter girly-looking guy with red eyes and black hair. They both should be wearing black cloaks with red clouds on them. Have you seen anyone like that?" He asked.

"Nope, I haven't." The man said in a surprisingly nice and warm voice.

"Okay, sorry for bothering you." Naruto bowed before leaving.

"What a nice man," He mused.

_Meanwhile._

"Kisame I got fish sticks for supper." Itachi said as he walked into the apartment they rented for the night. He was carrying a box.

"What!? _Fish_ sticks? My brethren!"

_Back with Naruto._

"Something smells fishy." Naruto said aloud as he sniffed the air. A metaphorical light bulb appeared over his head, "Kisame!"

He ran off, following his nose as it led him to an apartment. He knocked on the door.

_Scene change!_

"I'll get it," Kisame muttered grumpily as Itachi munched happily on fish sticks.

The blue man went up to the door and answered it.

_Super special awesome transition!_

The door swung open as Naruto came face to face with the man.

_Italics used to signify changing of view since I don't know how to do a line break, go!_

"Oh, are you selling cookies?" Kisame asked the little blonde figure.

_Are these Italics annoying you yet?_

"You're not Itachi," Naruto said as he looked at the man.

_Because they're kind of annoying me._

"No. I'm not," Said the figure.

_Okay, last one, I swear._

"Itachi? You mean that weird red-eyed guy who travels with the fish guy? Go to the other side of the apartment."

Underlined transition!

"Aw, you're not selling cookies? Bummer." The fish-man replied.

"I live in the apartment on the other side of this one, and I came to ask if you could keep the noise down." The little girl asked sweetly.

"Yeah, sure." Kisame said, waving the girl away sadly.

"Wait!" Came a yell as the door was about to close.

Naruto came screeching to a halt.

"Kisame!"

"Yes?" The fish-man asked.

"You Itachi Konoha Quick Sasuke Trouble Orochimaru Chunin Exams Hurry!" The blonde boy said in a blur before he ran out of chakra and poofed away.

"Huh?" The man asked, "Hey, Itachi, we need to go to Konoha. I think Orochimaru is going after your little brother." He added.

Itachi had already packed, and was heading out the door.

_Well… What do you think? I overdid it with rushing and humor, didn't I?_


	13. Pre-Exam Meet'n'Greet

_It occurs to me that in the last chapter, Naruto ate a fish raw, which seems really disgusting._

_Also, I'll try to make these next chapters serious._

Naruto sat against a tree, looking over some seals as Hinata practiced her jyuken in a clearing in one of the lesser used training grounds.

"What are you looking over," Hinata asked as she took a small break, sitting down next the boy a drinking some of the water they had brought.

Naruto remained quiet and focused on his work so that Hinata almost thought that he didn't hear her.

"You probably won't believe this, and you can't anyone. Got it?" Naruto said seriously, his eyes narrowing as he looked up from his notes.

Hinata gasped at the seriousness and nodded, "Yes, Naruto, I understand."

"Well, Lord Fourth, Minato Namikaze, was my father. Considering all of his enemies, Grandpa Third didn't want anyone to know. In fact, I don't think even I should know, but I do due to unperceived circumstances.

"Now I'm studying over some notes about the Flying Thunder God Technique, since I already learned his Rasengan."

"You're Lord Fourth's son!?" Hinata repeated.

"Yeah, but be quiet! No one can know until after I become a chunin!" Naruto said as he held her.

"Are you entering the Chunin Exams?" Hinata asked.

"Of course," Naruto stated, seriousness gone and immense pride being shown as he puffed out his chest, "Because I'm just that awesome! Kakashi recommended us and gave us the application forms the other day." The blonde held up the paper that he had filled out as soon as it was in his hands.

"Kakashi even redoubled our training. I've gotten a lot better at taijutsu and genjutsu – my weak points – Sakura is learning Medical ninjutsu, and Sasuke even unlocked his Sharingan. One eye even advanced to the second level."

_And now we skip to the day of the exams! Two days after that which is above._

"Guys, wait." Naruto said. His teammates paused to turn and look at the blonde – who was now wearing a dark brown tee shirt and just as dark brown pants. Ninja mesh armor covered his arms, and black gloves covered his hands, but not the fingers.

Black shinobi sandals adorned the blondes feet, now covering the heel, but not the toes.

His weapons pack and holster were both replaced by seals on his gloves, which were not seeable unless you looked really close.

And finally, his forehead protector was tied around his left arm and his goggles covered his eyes.

The blonde's hair had grown a little; he had not cut it since the academy, now five months ago.

"What is it, Naruto?" Sasuke asked, sounding a little annoyed. He was itching to get inside and start the exams.

Sasuke was wearing a black shirt and had bandages covering his arms and hands. He had donned blue shinobi pants for the occasion, and still wore his old style of sandals. The Uchiha emblem was now located on his left shoulder, and his headband was tied securely around his head.

"Yeah, Naruto, why should we wait? The exams are about to start." The girl asked, also annoyed. She too was as ready as ever.

Said girl was wearing a light green shirt that had sleeves, both of which were long enough to cover her arms. Her legs were covered by gray ninja pants, and her feet by blue ninja boots now.

Her hands were fully revealed for everyone to see, and her forehead was bare, because here head-ribbon was fastened with the Konoha plate, as it always had been.

"I'm sensing a group of genin on the second floor, along with Izumo and Kotetsu. I think we should skip that floor, because those two might be holding people up." Naruto answered. He did indeed sense them, too.

His teammates nodded, and they took off, running right up the wall, directly to a third floor window.

"Besides, most chunin and jonin use the window all the time." Naruto added with a smile before the team met up with Kakashi.

"Good, you all came." He said as his right eye looked down at his genin, who looked back with confused faced.

Sakura was the first to voice her confusion. "What do you mean by that, Sensei?"

"Well," The masked man started, "Simply put, this is a team exam."

"What?" It was Sakura again, "Then why'd you say it was an individual decision?"

"So you wouldn't feel pressured." Kakashi answered quickly, "Now listen, this test will the hardest thing you've ever faced. Danger, war, bloodshed, blah, blah, blah." He waved his hand as he talked, "Okay, so how are your special techniques coming along?"

Two weeks ago, Kakashi had told his team to learn a special technique each.

"I've nearly perfected mine." Sakura said, referring to her Cherry Blossom Storm, which was one of her few direct offensive techniques.

Sasuke spoke next, "Mine's very well refined." He was talking about one of his few supportive techniques, Fire Release: Ashen Wind.

And finally, "I can do mine without seals now." Naruto spoke of his father's Flying Thunder God Technique.

"Excellent, now go kick some ass!" Kakashi shouted, grinning.

The three genin saluted and burst through the doors with all of their enthusiasm.

_In the exam room._

"Eh… A little quick to the trigger there, Ace." Kakashi said to them from outside as every genin's undivided attention was thrust upon Team Seven.

As Kakashi poofed away, Naruto shouted, "I'm Naruto Uzumaki and I'll kick every last one of your asses to hell and back!"

He then turned to his teammates, grinning, and said, "Now that is how you make an entrance."

"Well that was some entrance." Kiba said as he walked up to them. Shino and Hinata followed, the latter giggling.

Before Kiba could speak again, a cry of "Sasuke!" was heard, and before he knew it, Sasuke was being groped by Ino.

"Get off of me." Sasuke groaned as he all but threw her off of his person. The Uchiha subconsciously stepped closer to Sakura as she yelled at Ino.

Naruto smiled, happy that his long-term plan was finally gaining results.

The blonde started to scan the room, before being interrupted by Hinata.

"You look nice Naruto." Hinata smiled, coming over to stand by him.

"Thanks, Hinata. You do, too." He smiled.

Hinata was wearing her normal attire, just without the jacket and with longer hair.

The noise of the Konoha Nine died down when a guy named Kabuto came up to them and offered advice as well as information on other ninja.


	14. How to Fail a Written Exam

"My name is Ibiki Morino, and I am the proctor for the first exam! Now sit down, shut up, and listen! I'm only going to say this once!" A scarred man shouted as he exploded into the room.

"What an entrance…" Naruto thought as he scrambled to his seat like every other genin.

When he sat down in the seat he was assigned, he noticed that it was right beside Gaara.

"Lucky me." Naruto thought as he received his test. "whatever, so, if I remember, the point of this test is gathering information and not backing out on a mission; so if I answer no questions, I'll pass, but if I write some answers and act confident, then Sakura will never have to try and give up for me!

"But I won't know the answer to the questions… Dammit! What do I do? I can't cheat, I always sucked at that." He thought as the proctor explained the rules.

"Wait, the point is to make everyone gather information, but they only would out of desperation. I know that you just need to stay for the tenth question to pass." He ranted mentally as the test began.

"When Naruto did this, he didn't answer a single question, and still passed… That's it! I'll just put down bogus answers!" Naruto grinned and looked to his paper again.

"Let's see… Question one: Shinobi _A_, a jonin, is standing on Tree _B_, which is ten and a half meters tall. Find the angle of trajectory needed for Shinobi _A _to throw Kunai _C_ at Shinobi _D_, a chuunin, and hit him. You can assume Chuunin is wounded too much to dodge.

"Answer one: Shinobi _A_ should just run down a hit the chuunin, considering the guy can't move."

Naruto laughed in his head, "They should accept this, anyway. It's right."

"Okay, question two: Assume the chuunin from above has a comrade. The comrade is thirty meters away, how fast will…" Naruto continued this way, reading the problems and giving creative answers.

Sakura and Sasuke saw this and figured he was cheating, as you were supposed to.

Forty-five minutes passed as the chuunin-hopefuls cheated their way through the first part of the exams.

"Alright! Pencils down and ears open! Time for the tenth question," the scarred proctor yelled.

"Now, if you don't want to continue, you don't have to. Quit now, if you want, but you'll fail.

"However, if you continue, and miss the question, then you'll fail, and never become a chuunin."

The protests came nigh instantaneously.

Naruto looked around confidently as he relaxed in his seat, "I got this," he thought, "It's all about confidence and the will to go on. There's no way you're – Dammit, Sakura!" He nearly screamed when he saw Sakura's hand start to go up.

Time seemed to slow down as his thoughts raced, "What do I do? What do I do? Why is she raising her hand? Dammit! No time to ponder, I have to act now!"

He flinched, "Here goes anything!" He thought, his hand rising up far faster than Sakura's.

He could feel the surprised stares of everyone that knew him focus on him. He glanced at Gaara to see cold eyes locked on him.

Just as it looked as if he were giving up, he slammed his hand on the desk.

"Ow…" Naruto thought as he stood, "No way in hell, you bastard!" He glared at the man, "No way am I giving in!"

"Dammit, what was it that Naruto said?" the boy thought.

Meanwhile, Ibiki was laughing internally, thinking, "I love this kid! He's got some serious guts. Oh my god, he and Anko… Shit…"

"Right then!" Naruto grinned, "So give us the tenth question already! Because I'll become the hokage whether I become chuunin or not! Stop wasting our time, you asshole!"

Everyone, examinees and examiners alike, paled at the thought of what Ibiki was about to do.

Said interrogation specialist frowned and walked right up to Naruto, towering over the boy even though he was standing, too.

"So, you think I'll just let you curse me out and go unpunished? I could easily have you and your team thrown out of the exams." Ibiki leaned down and glared at the boy.

"Dammit, Naruto! Stop antagonizing him!" Sasuke thought.

"I will never back down!" Naruto glared back as fiercely as he could.

"In that case, I guess I'll just have to…" Ibiki paused to stand up straight.

"Here it comes. Dammit!" Sasuke thought furiously.

"Naruto, you idiot." Thought Sakura.

"Naruto…" Hinata mumbled worriedly.

"Way to go, Naruto!" Kiba thought, almost laughing at the blonde's fearlessness.

"Oh boy… Troublesome Naruto." Shikamaru thought.

"… Yeah, I like French toast… Doo doo dee doo, can't wait to get a mouth full." Gaara thought.

"Here it comes." Naruto thought, resisting the urge to smirk. Resistance proved futile, however.

Ibiki was honestly surprised when he saw the boy smirking at him. "Does he know what I'll say, already? But, how? The only way he could know is if he knew the true test behind this one." The man ranted mentally, checking all possibilities, before pushing the thoughts to the back of his mind for now.

"… Pass all of you!" He shouted happily.

The genin nearly choked on air at that. All of a sudden, there were shouts and questions being aimed at none other than the proctor, most questioning his sanity. He didn't comment on those.

The ones asking what was going on, however, he answered with gusto.

As the speech came to an end, Naruto made two shadow clones, each taking a test and writing on the back hurriedly. "Almost out of time!" The boy thought, nearly panicking.

Ibiki noticed what the boy was writing, and questioned it mentally. "Such a strange child, why would he need to… Wait, does he really know…?"

Suddenly, a black ball erupted from the window, unfolding itself and growing to form a big black banner. The genin barely had time to process the words, "Single and sexy shinobi, Mitarashi Anko!" Before a woman came flying in after it.

Said woman was wearing a brown trench coat over a fishnet shirt - both of which did little to hide her assets – and an orange skirt. She had purple hair and brown eyes, and she was a little on the pale side.

She shouted a greeting to the genin, and without missing a beat, the Narutos' hands went up, revealing the backs of three tests, all of which had a big "10" written on them.

"Brilliant!" One shouted.

"What acrobatics!" The second's yell came after.

"And a perfect landing, too!" The final whiskered boy complimented loudly.

Ibiki's eyes widened, "He knew what was going to happen, and prepared for it – in a silly way, but still."

"Thank you! Thank you!" Anko said as she bowed, grinning. At the same time, the woman thought, "I like this kid." She straightened up, and beckoned the genin after her as she left.

_A little while later…_

Ibiki went up to the third test with a number on the back, Naruto's.

His eyes widened more and more as he read each ridiculous answer that was written. His eyes then settles on the final written question.

His jaw dropped at the note.

"I don't really know how to even begin to answer this question," It read, "So I leave you this note, saying, 'Screw you and your test! You can't fool me!' Muahaha!" And then there was a hastily drawn picture of a whiskered chibi – Naruto, he presumed – holding up a victory sign.

"He did know… Just who is that kid? Naruto Uzumaki…" Ibiki thought, utterly dumbfounded.


	15. Fox Vs Snake: Part One

_Four reviews in one day!? Now THAT'S motivation! Yeah!_

"… Now, do any of you maggots have a question?" The Anko asked loudly.

Naruto raised his hand, "Ugh… Yes?" Anko said, clearly annoyed that she was taken up on her offer.

"You said your single, right?" Naruto asked, causing Sakura to berate him, saying that he was already dating Hinata.

Anko, meanwhile, nearly face-planted at the stupid question, but answered none-the-less, "Uhh… Yeah, but sorry, you're too young for me."

"I know I'm dating Hinata!" Naruto shouted angrily at the pink haired girl. He then turned to Anko and walked up to her, giving a slip of paper, "It's not for me, but I have a friend that I want you to meet at this address. He's… Shy… But he wanted to meet you for some… _Alone_ time." The blonde said. "I have a feeling that you two will get along great, especially if you bring your copy of _Make-Out Marathon._" He added in a hushed tone.

"How do you even-"

"I know a lot," Naruto cut her off. "Now, start the test already!"

_In the Forest of Death (Dun Dun Dun~!)._

"Shit-mongers!" Naruto yelled as he was blown away by a large whirlwind.

"Dammit~!" A giant snake rushed out of the brush and swallowed him whole as he tried to get up.

"That's it! To hell with subtlety!" The boy screamed. He pulled as much chakra as he could out and, forming a cross with his hands, shouted at the top of his lungs, "Shadow Clone Jutsu!"

He willed more and more clones to appear, causing the snake to rapidly fatten up before bursting.

"That'll show you to mess with an Uzumaki you bastard snake!" The blondes yelled simultaneously, before they all rushed back in the direction of Orochimaru.

"I'm coming, Sasuke, I won't let that cursed seal appear. Not this time!" It was only the original that spoke this time.

The miniature army broke through the tree-line into the small clearing, almost all of them dashing to surround it.

A few blonde boys went to evacuate Sakura from the area and the original transformed into Sasuke before substituting with that same dark haired boy just before Orochimaru's neck came rushing at him.

The snake sannin noticed just in time that Naruto had switched, and instead head-butted the boy, whose transformation then dropped.

The snake sneered at the blonde before sending a snake in a horizontal arc to attack him. The snake opened it mouth, and a long sword came soaring out, cutting deeply into Naruto's side.

"What's with people hitting my side with a sword!?" The blonde thought as the blade extended and sent him flying into a tree. "Why not the leg, or an arm… Something less painful! Dammit!"

He jumped back up at the sannin, who was leaping towards Sasuke.

Naruto intercepted him mid-flight and quickly formed a rasengan. The blonde gained no small amount of satisfaction the legendary ninja showed. However, the genin's attack was still batted away effortlessly.

Without missing a beat, Naruto let the jutsu dissipate and stuck a kunai with three prongs into the back of the sannin.

The missing ninja didn't even acknowledge it, choosing instead to continue his journey to the Uchiha. He did, however, swiftly send a snake, larger this time, to slam into Naruto full force.

The whiskered youth plummeted quickly, crashing to the ground below.

Grunting with immense pain, Naruto clenched his bloody side, sure that something was broken. He ignored the demonic chakra that was healing him as he watched on in horror at the Snake Sage's fangs sinking into Sasuke's unguarded neck.

He stayed there, lying on the ground, frozen in place as his eyes tracked Sasuke's tensed up body while it fell to the ground.

The Uchiha's bloodcurdling scream resonated throughout the area as his descent continued.

Sakura, who was lying unconscious a few yards away from the blonde, was the only one spared from the scene.

Suddenly, the noise stopped, and there was beat of silence after Sasuke's now limp body crashed to the ground directly under the bough that the legendary ninja was standing on.

Naruto's eyes squeezed shut a in a sudden burst of both physical and emotional agony. Tears streamed down his face as he released scream of his own towards the heavens.

His chakra reacted violently to his state of mind, and the blonde glared at the sannin in pure, unadulterated rage.

"That's right, boy… Succumb to your hatred," Kurama said in his mind. "Let your anger burn… Use it! Use my power! Let me take over and I'll kill that man and anyone else who wronged you!" The fox coaxed after sitting out for the entire ordeal earlier.

"Submit to your fury and let me reign with your hatred!" the beast roared, "That man's suffering will be endless! All you must do is unleash that anger!"

Naruto blinked and stood up, his head hanging low. An enormous burst of chakra caught the attention of almost everyone within miles of the area. Fierce winds erupted around the young boy and the earth beneath him shattered, sending cracks in all directions.

Chaos reigned in the forest, sending a surge of unbridled terror through the hearts and souls of every last being who felt it.

Then it stopped.

Orochimaru looked on at the boy in mild shock and a large amount of fear.

Naruto's whiskers moved, becoming longer and thicker, as well as more wild-looking. A feral, red aura seemed to envelope him. His head rose.

The boy glared fiercely at the pale man with his red eyes, slit pupils running right through the middle of the irises.

His anger sent a phantom surge of energy through his system, as an icy chill flew through his veins. The animalistic look on his face vanished as the boy's body relaxed and the aura dissipated.

_Seems like a good spot to end this chapter, don't you think?_


	16. Chapter 16

Well... I am truly sorry, but, I'm really not. Look, I lost interest in this story. It had a good run, I guess, but long stories just don't seem to be my thing.


	17. Fox Vs Snake: Part Two

_Ha! Like hell I'd stop now. It just got good! Glad to see people that don't want me to quit, though._

… _That was fun._

"Oh, shit…" Orochimaru snapped as he quickly jumped out of the path of the speedy kunai that had just been launched at him.

Naruto growled loudly and jumped after the man, hair waving wildly in the harsh winds created by his pure speed. Demonic chakra flowed through him as adrenaline and he intercepted the older ninja mid-flight.

The snake sannin backhanded the boy before grabbing his leg and preparing a Five Element Seal.

Orochimaru attempted to thrust his hand at Naruto, but the child dodged it.

"What, first you give Sasuke a hickey; and now you're trying to grope me? The academy was right, you are a pedophile." The blonde mocked.

At the mocking, two emotions overwhelmed Orochimaru. First was surprise at the fact that the boy was capable of coherent thought; secondly, anger that he was baiting him – and it was working.

With renewed motivation to continue the fight, the more experienced of the two roughly threw the less experienced away and shot multiple fireballs with weapons hidden inside.

"Shit!" Naruto screamed mentally as the fiery weapons impaled him in multiple places, one stopping just short of a particularly bad spot for a kunai to be.

"Alright, You Damned Bastard Fox! More power, NOW! That man is going to suffer!" Naruto shouted at the still enraged fox.

Without missing a beat, Kurama complied, and Naruto felt the chakra return, only denser this time. He noted the forming of ethereal ears and a single red, transparent tail forming from the cloak.

Naruto briefly felt his consciousness shift, disorienting him long enough for Orochimaru to jump him.

Still in a daze, Naruto felt his mental barriers weaken further and further as he took more hits from the vicious onslaught.

"What the hell is going on!?" A loud, obnoxious voice shouted, though only Naruto heard it.

"Wha- What? Who… Who is that?" Naruto asked, his eyes widening as suddenly his was a hundred meters from Orochimaru.

"Who is this? This is Na-" The phantom voice was cut off from Naruto's ears as Orochimaru slammed him into a tree again.

Naruto shouted loudly, "Shut the hell up, dammit!" Orochimaru froze for an instant, giving Naruto enough time to spout a second tail, and the guest to say, "But YOU'RE the one who asked ME who I am!" Accusingly.

Naruto vanished from Orochimaru's sight momentarily to continue the conversation.

"Tell me later! In the middle of something!" Naruto shouted aloud again.

"Is he speaking to someone telepathically?" Orochimaru thought to himself as he darted up to where he heard the voice. "How is that possible!? He shouldn't know any telepathy jutsu!"

A third tail erupted from Naruto's hind end, and the chakra cloak became more like boiling lava than flames, both brighter and denser than ever before. He swatted Orochimaru away and formed a rasengan, feeling his consciousness fade even more. His eyes began to see nothing but dark red shapes.

"I'm Naruto Uzumaki and I won't be silenced!" The voice shouted, Naruto unconsciously mirroring the action.

"'S- Silenced'?" Orochimaru asked, stuttering.

The voice's outburst caused Naruto to stumble and drop the rasengan, his conscious returning to an extent.

"Na- Naruto?" The blonde boy asked mentally, forgetting the snake ninja completely.

"That's right!" The voice said, much stronger and clearer than before.

A few seconds passed as the boy tried to decipher the situation. To Orochimaru, he was just standing there, staring into space.

"I will not be ignored!" Orochimaru shouted as he dashed towards the youth.

Kurama sat in his cage, pouting as he the fight. Seeing Naruto's lack of attentiveness, and ignoring the other entity completely, he decided to take initiative.

Naruto let loose a fierce roar as a fourth tail sprouted upon Kurama's possession.

The four extra appendages flew forth when the boy, now covered in dense, dark red and black demonic energy with glowing white eyes and a mouth to match, dropped to his all-fours. They slammed into the elder ninja, rocketing him through a few of the bigger trees around the area. The long-forgotten shadow clones that the sannin smashed into dispelled on impact, the rest following due to the shockwave created.

Orochimaru kept flying away, eventually crashing out of the forest of death and skidding a couple of miles before stopping. This was good for Naruto, because Kurama controlled or not, he still was a child.

The sudden popping of all shadow clones, all with a distinct adrenaline boosted memory, combined with the two entities in Naruto's head along with Naruto's suddenly gaining control back out of Kurama's sheer surprise at the twist, caused the boy's mind to nearly collapse. The boy himself fainted immediately.

_End of the Second Exam, Four Days Later. Tower of Death._

A tired groan escaped Naruto's previously inactive mouth. He slowly sat up, alerting both Sasuke and Sakura of his awareness.

Naruto barely even noticed that two were practically laying on his bed, pushing him over the far right side.

"What… the hell happened?" Naruto asked, surprised at how exhausted and parched his voice sounded.

Sakura yawned, "We've been at the tower for about three days now. After that weird lady attacked us, we don't really know what happened, but when I woke up, you were falling unconscious. I found the heaven scroll that the lady had – It was covered in some kind of gross, thick, smelly goo – and pocketed, then lugged you two to a safe spot."

Sasuke absently rubbed his neck and leaned tiredly into Sakura, "Then, when I woke up, I carried you as we headed here." He let out a mighty yawn himself.

Suddenly, Naruto shifted. His eyes became a little bit brighter as an absolutely gigantic smile adorned his face.

"So, we passed the exams!? Woohoo!" The boy shouted, all previous inhibitions gone, causing Sasuke and Sakura to wince.

A growl resonated through the infirmary room, and immediately, Naruto was almost flying out of the room, shouting at the top of his lungs, "I'm so hungry! Food, food, food!"

"… That must've have been serious mental breakdown that he suffered if he is acting like a freaking toddler…" Sasuke muttered.

Sakura merely nodded as they slowly trotted after the blonde.

_Well, now that you've had time to adjust to the fact that, NO, I'm NOT ending this story (Like I said, it's just getting good!), I'll leave you with this, "What the hell is happening with Naruto?"_


	18. Preliminary Exam

_Eleven days isn't too bad, right?_

Naruto's eyes slightly narrowed at the sight of Kabuto giving up.

"It is go time," he thought, before going over to Kabuto and giving him a handshake and saying it was nice to meet him.

"Good luck next time." The blonde said. Kabuto nodded.

_Later…_

Hinata worriedly watched a hyperactive Naruto jump about excitedly, cheering for Sasuke. It was so unlike him too make such a spectacle of himself.

… Okay, that was a complete and utter lie, but still, this was a bit overkill, even for the blonde. He had even reverted back to outrageously orange clothing.

Said blonde yelled, "Way to go, Sasuke!" As the Uchiha climbed back up the stairs, idly clutching his shoulder.

A beaten and battered Yoroi, courtesy of one of Sasuke's techniques that is not the Lion's Barrage, lay on the stretcher as he was being carried out.

Sakura and Ino had already faced each other, as had Shikamaru and the girl from sound – Kin.

Sakura surprised everyone with her Cherry Blossom Storm, which had nearly covered the lower area of the arena in pink before converging in on Ino for the Knockout; and Shikamaru had tricked Kin into his Shadow Possession and made her bang her head on the wall.

The computer cycled through names again before settling on the competitors for the next match.

"Yeah! My turn! My turn!" Naruto screamed as he leaped down to the middle of the arena. Kiba followed a little less eagerly.

"Ha! This'll be so easy! We lucked out, Akamaru, we get to fight the dead-last." The fanged boy said. Because friend or not, he still didn't know of Naruto's true power.

"Begin!" The ever-sick Hayate yelled with a violent cough.

Almost immediately, and far before Kiba could throw out another taunt, Naruto was sprinting towards him at a speed that even surprised the blonde. He quickly pulled a kunai out of his pouch, and in a well-practiced motion, launched it at Kiba.

The Inuzuka dodged fairly quickly, before darting at the blonde alone, leaving Akamaru to watch.

Kiba yelled as he dropped to a crouch and then jumped into a spin.

Almost immediately, Naruto's eyes changed. Suddenly, gone was the hyperactive, "Squirrel!" look; a hyper-aware one replacing it. Naruto leaped out of the way of the drill, which barely missed him by a couple of centimeters.

The look on Naruto's face, unnoticed by everyone, reverted back to the dumbass look as Kiba through down a smoke bomb and started beating Naruto's guts out.

A loud, piercing scream of agony erupted from the smoke as Kiba rammed into Naruto's stomach, which was still sore from the stress put on the seal a few days prior.

The blonde came spinning out of the smoke holding his stomach tightly as he let a fierce glare don his face.

Naruto slammed into a wall, and his arms moved from his stomach to his head, where two entities were fighting for control, unbeknownst to everyone but them.

The match continued this way until Naruto got a lucky hit in on Kiba, who then kicked it up a notch, adding Akamaru into the fray as the dog transformed into a second Kiba.

The beating that took place after that was far worse than at first, and soon, Naruto was smacking against the ceiling with ripped clothes and bloody marks all over his person.

Clinging to the ceiling as he let Kurama's chakra heal him, Naruto, now serious again, clutched his head and yelled at Kiba.

"You know how to tree-walk, right, Kiba?" The blonde yelled.

Everyone looked on, flabbergasted at the random question, and started to think that Naruto was taking on some brain damage.

Kiba however, was suffering damage to his pride at the seeming insult.

"Of course I do, Dumbass!" The feral boy growled.

"Cool! Tell me! What happens when you put too much chakra into it?" The up-side down blonde asked mirthfully.

"You get pushed off!" Kiba said, preparing for him and Akamaru to jump Naruto as soon as he came down. The pair ignored the strange looks everyone else was giving the whiskered boy.

"Awesome. Last question! Do you know how much chakra I have?" Naruto asked simply.

At that seemingly innocent question, all the people who had seen – or felt – the extent of Naruto's chakra paled considerably as the others, who didn't know, watched on with growing confusion.

"What are you talking about, Jackass?" The fanged boy asked, questioning his opponent's sanity briefly.

"Nothing." Naruto grinned.

_With the others._

"Oh no," Kakashi mumbled, only just loud enough for his companions to hear.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Sasuke inquired of the jonin.

"Yeah, what's Naruto talking about? And what does this have to do with the fight?" Ino asked after that.

"Kurenai," Kakashi said seriously to the red-eyed genjutsu mistress.

"I know, but Kiba wouldn't listen anyway. There's nothing I can do."

"What? What are you guys talking about?" Sakura asked.

"What's going on?" Shikamaru asked his sensei.

Asuma stared at Naruto contemplatively. "Well, Shikamaru, there is a very good possibility that Kiba could get seriously hurt. If Naruto's mental condition is worsening as much as we think, Kiba might even die."

Everyone asked, and Hinata spoke up, "What do you mean, 'Mental condition'?"

Kakashi answered, "Something happened in the forest, and Naruto – we believe – is suffering quite a deal of psychological trauma from it."

"Does this have anything to do with those two huge chakra levels that were going toe to toe during the last exam?" Shino asked.

"Huge powers…? Two?" Sasuke asked.

Kakashi only nodded.

_Back with Naruto and Kiba in the Ring._

A blue, swirling aura encased Naruto and was quickly channeled to his feet and hands as he crouched on the ceiling, up-side down and looking down to Kiba.

The pressure built up rapidly, until one could feel the roof shaking.

Unexpectedly, and unfortunately, Naruto's mindset reverted back to the mindless oaf again. He immediately lost control and the chakra that was built up was released in a single burst.

The blonde boy was rocketed down by the combined force of chakra propulsion and gravity, slamming into the ground four meters from Kiba and Akamaru. His opponents didn't have time to react as they were quickly thrown back by the shockwave. They landed a good way away, out cold.

Slowly, Naruto stood up, and looked at the two with a proud grin. His entire body was shaking heavily, and his breathing was hindered.

"Winner, Uzumaki Naruto." His friends cheered as he was carried away, alongside Kiba and his dog, toward the infirmary.

_Back with the others, again._

"What was that!?" That was the first thing heard after the cheering quieted.

Kakashi answered again. "Naruto pumped chakra to his arms and legs, as in the tree-walking exercise. Except, he used so much, that the force propelled him at an astounding rate towards the floor. In essence, he made himself a meteor. Reckless, yes, but also effective. And lethal to both parties.

"But enough of that, look up." The masked man said simply.

Everyone, following his command, did so, and promptly dropped their jaws to the floor.

Where the ceiling should have been, was a huge crater that almost tore the entire roof apart. Support beams, roof tiles, insulation and the lot were hanging precariously from the top of the room, with more than just a few bits of them falling to the floor.

Several beams of sunlight streaked inside the building as well.

All in all, the damage was severe.

"All that, with just chakra? Damn…"

"Well," Gai spoke this time. "Raw chakra is very powerful, though hard to control when outside of the body."

Neji nodded at the proclamation.

_So, what do you think? I've been thinking of the chakra rocket for a while now. Along with another development that will show up at the finals._


	19. leave blade

_Okay, so 'Taking It Easy' broke his arms. So I, his little brother who is more awesome than him in every way, will write this chapter. You can call me 'Taking It Hard.'_

_Read that aloud, now big bro's dying of laughter, don't know why though._

_Anyway, I don't know how to write fight scenes, so we'll be skipping the rest of the preliminaries._

_Enjoy my story!_

_Naruto's training!_

Naruto was out in a clearing in a wooded area. He was humming to himself while he practiced using ninja wire.

"Spiderman… Spiderman…" He mumbled. He was currently swinging from tree to tree on the wire by using chakra.

As he took a break and headed to his favorite ramen stand, a leaf flew right by him.

_Since big bro forgot about little Kono-whatshisface._

Suddenly, leaves started storming Naruto, and he frantically dodged out of the way.

"What's happening to me?" Naruto yelled.

"Got you now, Boss!" The boy yelled as he appeared.

"You?" Naruto said, "Why did you attack me?"

"You said, 'I better not see you again until you can attack me with leaves.' I got rid of the rustling that the leaves made, so now, I am attacking you with leaves."

"Oh yeah, I remember that now. Good job!" Naruto said giving a thumbs up to the boy.

_There you go! _


	20. Chapter 20

_So, after some begging and a deal to do my homework, my buddy tricked me into to writing the next chapter._

_Of course, now he can't take down that other one. Hehe, taking it hard…_

_Anyway, I can actually listen to directions, so this'll be just like he's writing this himself._

"Spiderman… Spiderman…" Naruto mumbled, using chakra to make the ninja wire stick to branches and extending his sense widely as he swung through the forest. "Coolest. Idea. Ever." He said, letting himself fall to the ground.

"I think I got that covered. What's next?" The blonde asked himself, pulling out his list.

"I'm fighting Neji in the finals. So these techniques to catch him off guard and attack long-range are important. Plus, I need to show finesse and cunning. And possibly kick him in the balls."

He skimmed his list, marking off 'Wire' when he got to it. "Now for… Flying? About time."

He grinned.

_Meanwhile, in another place since you've already got spoilers for the finals… A quick flashback to Naruto's reaction when Kakashi decided to train Sasuke! Yeah…_

"Okay," Naruto said, "Fine."

_Lame. I know. Time for JIRAIYA! YES! FINALLY! My personal favorite character._

"Jiraiya, teach me summoning." Naruto said. When Jiraiya declined, he added, "Don't make me follow you everywhere while yelling 'pervert!' repeatedly." He glared at the white-haired man.

"Sigh… Fine."

And so he learned summoning.

_Back to the future! Love that movie._

"Now that I can fly, time for the final part of my list…" Naruto said, floating a few feet off the ground.

_Now TIE hates me, but I'm bored. Bye. Did I upload it right?_


End file.
